Warhammer Underworlds: More Battles in Shadespire - and DEATHGORGE!

Another Sunday happened and that means Warhammer Underworlds at my place!

(except that it won't this coming Sunday.. for.. REASONS!) 

As with last week, we played the first game in Shadespire - mostly because I wanted to use my fancy new Soul Refractors!

I was playing Skabbik's Plaguepack. Orion brought out the Chosen Axes (with a Void-Cursed Thralls nemesis deck). Amanda played Elathain's Soulraid. Nick played Da Kunnin' Krew. 

Orion started off with attacking the Orruks and then got ganged up on. 

Despite losing one of my minions in the first round, the skaven were pretty much left to their own devices and everyone ignored them... probably on account of the SMELL! 

I was mostly trying to score objective cards and avoid combat. I think the few objective cards I'd lose from their rivals deck when I eventually get around to making a Nemesis deck is the ones requiring killing things.. and just sneak around doing their sneaky-smelly-befouling thing! 

Not sure how well that will work in one-on-one games?

Last of the Fyreslayers... did not go quietly! 

Ouch! Skabbik being stabbed by Krookgrin... 

Ended the game with most of my rats alive. The Chosen Axes had been wiped out and, I think, only Spinefin was left of the Soulraid... who can't actually DO anything... 

I did about as well as I think I possibly could have... but Nic did BETTER! I think this is the first game Nic has won in all our Sunday four-player games!! Woo!!

I may have to revisit Da Kunnin' Krew, because they kicked butt! 

For our second game we played in the DEATHGORGE - now that I have four boards for that setting (now that Wintermaw is out!) 

I decided to switch things up and dug out the Thricefold Discord. Amanda decided to go back to her roots and pulled out Morgwaeth's Blade-Coven. Orion decided to try out the NEW Thorns of the Briar Queen deck. And Nic just stuck with Da Kunnin' Krew as they were working out so well! 

I fairly aggressively went after the Thorns. 

Da Kunnin' Krew and Morgwaeth's Blade-Coven kind of just had their own little battle over on the other side.. with a few ghosties mixing it up with them. 

I took out a few of the Ghosties... but it took all three Daemons to gang up on them to take out ghosts with two wounds... it was kind of sad... 

We did take out Varclav - with two attacks, at one point though... 

There were a few fights where the Orruks and Murder Aelves just stood next to each other having a slap-fight, but no one was able to deal any damage because they would only roll successes for attacks and their opponent would roll a crit for defence!? Like that fight between Krookgrin and Kyrae in the back corner... The fight started in the first round and they were still going at it near the end of the third round?!

I think the Everhanged did more damage to us than we did to them?!

The Heralds of Slaanesh did get their shit together enough to take down the Briar Queen as well, tohugh... 

Little fight in the corner still going on at the end of the game! 

Amanda won this one, Scoring as many points and Nic and Orion together?! I think she scored one objective from Paths of Prophecy that gained her FIVE Glory points (which was a third of the points she scored in the game)?! 

I wasn't TOO far behind... 

Good fun. This was the FORTIETH (40!!) game of Warhammer Underworlds I've played so far this year!?

I really need to sort out some Nemesis decks for a few of my warbands! I also wouldn't mind getting some one-on-one games in!? 

No game this Sunday because Amanda is in San Fransisco! She's there for a one day workshop-confernece-thingy for work and then tacked on a few days to explore the city with a friend she's meeting up with from Ottawa, and won't be back until Sunday evening... 

Orion and Nic are both getting their hair coloured on Sunday, which I can't wait to see as I am sure they will be fabulous! 

Warhammer Underworlds: Last Game in March!

Yesterday, the last Sunday in March, Nic and Orion came over to play some more Warhammer Underworlds. 

In our first game I rolled out with my new Skabbik's Plague Pack. They had not done well in their first game against Amanda playing Elathain's Soulraid. 

Amanda was playing Elathain's Soulraid again, Nic played Cyreni's Razors, and Orion was playing the Crimson Court. 

Cyreni's starrted off the bullying of the rats by charging in with THE SQUID and killing poor Poxlix... 

Vellas charged in to attack Tammael. 

And quicly found herself surrounded by Elathain's entire warband!? 

I'd had a plan that mostly involved maneuvering and trying to score objective cards... but then Cyreni, herself, came after my warband... 

Grand Melee in the middle of the board. 

Skabbik... maneuvering and scoring objective cards. 

Cyreni made the mistake of NOT killing rats at the beginning of the next round and she was just too tempting a target for Rabidius - and if he DIDN'T do something, she'd be killing rats... so Rabidius took her out! 

but then the SQUID came for Rabidius! 

Elsewhere, Skabbik, just doing his move around the board and score points thing, hoping no one would notice! 

And maneuvering back to befoul multiple territories again at the end of round two ... AND score MORE objectives!? 

Beginning of round three, I had no more passive objective cards or need to maneuver rats around to befoul territories... so we went on the attack! 

Rikit moved up and... hit someone..? 

Gah, I missed a few opportunities for pictures... there was a BIG mess of fighters here in the middle... this is the aftermath. the rats took out Fuirann and made Count Duval afraid enough that he actually ran away! 

I ended up winning this game with 20 Glory points! This was largely because it was a multi-player game and I had a few Objective cards that scored for "X Enemy Fighter out of action AND..." and all I had to do was the "AND..." because it does not matter WHO killed the enemy fighters, just that there are that many out of action! So all I had to do was concentrate on getting my rats to the places they needed to be, and hope that not too many tried to pick on the all too easy targets that they are! There is no way I'd be able to take out that many fighters myself, AND do the other things. Those cards probably have to go... 

I'm still not super sure how to PLAY these. I read some suggestions on Reddit - where someone else asked for tips on how to play. At least one, possibly more, had suggested as using them as "Suicide Aggro" - just charging them into enemy territory to kill things, knowing they are going to die, but hopefully score enough Glory before doing so... 

I never seem to have much luck with Aggro... because it is so reliant on rolling at least average rolls... and... that doesn't seem to work out for me!?

For Game Two I switched it op and pulled out Mollog's Mob to play with the new cards from the Rivals of the Mirrored City box, I'd bought the day before. 

Orion stuck with the Crimson Court, but Amanda decided to try out the new cards for the Thorns of the Briar Queen and Nic switched things up as well and played Grashrak's Despoilers. 

Tried to move up and bonk... and missed... 

See... aggro just don't work so well for me... 

Mollog chasing down Grashrak.

Orion had split his warband and half of them savaged the Thorns of the Briar Queen. and the other half went and killed half of Grashrak's Desppoilers... 

and when there was no more of them they turned on poor little Spiteshroom!?

Chasing down Grashrak! 

Orion did AMAZING. Crimson Court ended up scoring TWENTY FIVE glory in this game. 

I like Mollog's new cards... better than the previous set, but still needs some editing. I've heard some good things about pairing it with the Voidcursed Thralls rivals deck, to make a Nemesis deck! Too many things I want to play with. I'd also like to play more with Skabbik's Plaguepack and make a Nemesis deck for them... of course, as soon as I'm done the other new warbands, I'm going to want to play with THEM!?!?

Maybe I'll just be playing a new warband each week until I'm done them all in September... and THEN I'll start picking a few to try and learn to play really well!? 

Warhammer Underworlds: Rivals of the Mirrored City and Zondra's Gravebreakers

Destroying any chance of being "in the black" with the painted versus purchased, I picked up Zondra's Gravebreakers and the Rivals of the Mirrored City this morning... 

All the new toys

Between Zondara's Greavbreakers and the Rivals of the Mirrored City, this adds another THIRTY miniatures to the Purchased pile - bringing the total to 73, so far, this year - versus the 38 that I have painted! Mind you, last year I only painted 66 miniatures in the ENTIRE YEAR, so I feel like I'm doing a bit better this year... Unfortunately, Warhammer Underworlds: Wintermaw will be out in just two weeks, and that's going to add another TEN to the total!? (Why so soon, GW!? WHY!?). After that there shouldn't be any new stuff for a month or so, giving me a chance to catch up a bit. 

I'm going to try REALLY HARD to finish up the Sons of Velmorn... because they are so very close now! But I REALLY want to get painting Zarbag's Gitz and Zondra's Gravebreakers! All the Z ones... Ha! 

I was organizing the Rivals decks into these boxes and took this shot as a visual representation of the warbands, sort of... From left to right are Order, Destruction, Chaos and Death. the closer sets within those groupings are the ones that are done, the further sets are still to do. 

So... done more than I have to do, at least... I seem to like getting Orruks and Ogors and Troggoths and Grotty Gitz done... the only ones not completed in that category are the one's I just picked up!? 

There are another dozen boxes with the generic rivals decks as well....

Warhammer Underworlds - Another Four-Player Sunday

As if playing Warhammer Underworlds at the Warhammer store on Friday evening, and a 2000 point practice game of Warhammer 40,000 (10th Edition) on Saturday wasn't enough gaming for one weekend.... Nic and Orion came by to join Amanda and myself to play a pair of four-player games of Warhammer Underworlds (for a second Sunday in a row!) 

GAME ONE

For our first game I was pretty excited to try out the freshly painted Grinkrak's Looncourt. Amanda decided to change it up and try out Lady Harrow's Mournflight. Nic wanted to try out the Grymmwatch. Orion played with the Chosen Axes - which she was determined to make work (The warband was recently acquired, fully-painted, and she'd played one game with them and they were handed their asses!) 

Amanda and I were just playing with the Rivals decks for our warbands. I'm not sure if the deck Nic used was the Relic deck I'd put together for the Grymwatch (like, years ago... before they were even CALLED "Relic Decks") of if he sorted out the Grymwatch's and just used a Rivals deck as well... Orion was either using Fearsome Fortress... or perhaps had just shuffled the full Chosen Axes deck in with the Fearsome Fortress deck and played with whatever she drew?! 

I don't remember who ended up picking boards first... but the Looncourt ended up on the Chamber of Genesis board (from the Harrowdeep Core Box). Nic also selected a watery board - The Tortured Coil (from the Nethermaze Core Box) - so it ended up looking like the Beastgrave was suddenly a waterfront property with the watery grave of Harrowdeep washing up on its shores! Amanda played on Ambertrap Nest board (from the Direchasm Core Box) and Orion played on the Shrine of the Silent People board (from the Beastgrave Core Box).

Grinkrak's Looncourt all set up and ready to go! 

The Looncourt started the hostilities - as I went first in the first round - with Skolko and Pronk launching a squig at The Widow Caitha... and taking her out of action!!!

Yikes... Had a bad feeling those ghosties would be coming for me! 

(I was not wrong!) 

I did get three Quest Objective cards right off and assigned them to three of my crew. the Quest Objective cards are a new sort of mechanic for the Looncourt. Rather than holding them in hand, they can be assigned to specific goblins who, when they achieve the Quest (Scoring the Objective Card!) are inspired (with the exception of Grinkrak - who inspires when three of the others are inspired). Half of the deck is Quest Objectives and MOST of them are Surge Objectives. 

I probably need to spend some time reading and re-reading these and figuring out who really would be the best to assign them too as they come up... I feel like part way through the game I may have made a mistake - or sould have, at least, chosen a little better as others did the thing that someone else needed to do to score their Quest Objective.

Regardless, it was fun and a bit different. 

Dwarves and Ghould went right at it and started smashing each other. 

The Myrmourn Banshees of Lady Harrow's Mournflight did, in fact, come for my goblinses! 

But they also fought over all the objecive markers on the border with the Dwarves... so it wasn't a total onslaught... 

though for a little bit it looked like a crowded goblin/ghost mosh-pit over at my end of the table... 

Ghouls joining in the party - sending bats after Grinkrak and The Butcher after Da Wonky Lance! 

In the second round, I drew objectives that involved being in enemy territory, so I kind of disengaged and tried to score those, hoping the Banshees would be kept occupied by the Fyreslayers and Ghouls they were fighting elsewhere! 

And... that largely succeeded! 

Huzzah!... though I think that frightening Fireslayer knew we were up to something... luckily he had a charge token and coudln't really mess with my plans! 

Grinkrak, with some help from Skolko and Pronk, chased off the Ghouly bats. 

In the third round, I had an Objective that scored two Glory Points if each surviving friendly fighter is Inspired and/or has one or more upgrades... and Snorbo was the only fighter left in my warband that has neither... so I kind of charged him into combat with the leader of the Fyreslayers - who only had one wound left... I figured I'd either take him out and score some glory, or he'd take Snorbo out and I'd score the card! In the end I think it was Duke Crakmarrow that moved up and took out Snorbo..

The ghosties finally did come for me and took Nagz out of action... 

But Pokin' Snark got out of there and made another attack at the leader of the Chosen Axes... and... I MIGHT have taken him out of action... or maybe it was SOMEONE else I took out of action with a card called "Stick in the Boot" played on a Vulnerable Enemy (with only one wound remainging) adjacent to a friendly fighter... deals the enemy one damage! Ha! Mean little goblinses! I love them! 

No, it was someone else, somewhere else because that fucking stubborn little dwarf was still holding the Objective Marker at the end of the game. 

IN the end, the Goblins did pretty okay for themselves! I scored SIXTEEN Glory... which TIED with the Chosen Axes... who won.. 

Because they were holding an objective at the end of the game and I was not! 

Considering the game had started with boards looking pretty crowded with 22 fighters (7 Ghould, 7 Goblins, 4 Fyreslayers, 4 Banshees) things were looking pretty empty at the end. Ghouls and Fyreslayers only had one left, each. There were two goblins and two Banshees (Okay, technically goblins started with eight and ended with three - but two of them, Skolko and Pronk, are on the same base!) 

The Goblins were a LOT of fun to play... I think one-on-one play with them could have been an entirely different ketttle of squigs... but I think they'll be a regular on my Underworlds boards! 

GAME TWO

For our second game, I switched things up and tried out Hrothgorn's Mantrappers. I've only played them once before and it... did not go well... Amanda, playing Morgwaeth's Blade-Coven just slaughtered them - taking out Hrothgorn at the beginning of the second round, leaving nothing but a couple of the useless gitz and the sabretooth cat. I figured it was time to give him another chance... Just played with his Rivals Deck. 

Nic took the Thorns of the Briar Queen and quickly put some sort of Nemesis deck together for them. Amanda stuck with Lady Harrow's Mournflight. Orion decided to try the Eyes of Nine with the Force of Frost deck...? I think it was just the Force of Frost rivals deck on its own, none of the Eyes of Nine cards mixed in...?

They were not painted... I... I didn't say anthing. Maybe I just have to get over that. It seems like it's the way things are with Warhammer Underworlds - some people just play with unpainted stuff. 

Or I just say, MY HOUSE MY RULES - get them painted for NEXT TIME!!! 

Eyes of Nine was a warband I'd always wished I could have tracked down - just because they looked really neat... which is, honestly, the main motivating factor in any miniature purchases!? (I also thought they could be handy in Souldbound - the role-playing game - as a number of the canned adventures have Tzeentch minions as opponents!). Never did managed to track them down, and I kind of let the idea go, now that I have Ephilim's Pandemonium (a NEW Tzeentch Warband that came with Wyrdhollow!) 

I digress... 

I was set up on Penitent's Throne board (from the Nightvault Core Box). Amanda picked The Arcane Nexus (from the Shattered City Board Pack). Nic took the Shyishian Stardial board (from the Shadespire Core Box). Orion completely messed up our nearly all Shadespire board with The Iceswirl Maw board (from the Deathgorge Core Box) - which kind of made sense though, playing the Forces of Frost deck!

In the first round, Lady Harrow swooped into my territory and took out Bushwakka - who can set up little traps on the board... but then didn't like being surrounded by other little grots and floated off elsewhere =, 

The Screaming Maiden floated right into the middle of the Eyes of Nine and battled with them for a bit. 

The other Banshees mixed it up with the Chainrasps of the Thorns of the Briar Queen... 

Eventually it was down to Hrothgorn and Luggit and Thwak... trying to deal with a pair of Brimstone Horrors in our territory... I had an objective card that I'd misread and thought it required no enemy in my territory, so Luggit and Thwak stuck around to try and take it out.. but instead were finished off by the pair of horrors... 

Other than the brimstone horrow, the Eyes of Nine had been whittled down to only only their leader; Vortemis the All-Seeing... 

Hrothgorn charged and killed Vortemis... then turned and Shanked the Briar Queen. 

It was a weird game... Nic had started off with a few Glory points - gaining four fairly quickly. I don't think I scored any in the first round. Amanda caught up to nic and went flying past as we went into the third round. Orion and I were fighting over third and fourth place, it seemed... I started the third round with only two Glory Poinsts, and I don't think Orion was much further ahead... but we both kind of pulled it out of the fire! Both Orion and I scored a BUNCH in the final round and the End Game... She ended up with 12 and I had 9 (though, if I'd read the card properly, I would have scored another two (Always Moving - Scored in an end phase if there is at least one surviving friendly fighter AND there are no FRIENDLY fighters in your territory....) I'd thought it said ENEMY and there was that Brimstone Horror... so I would have had 11 which would have propelled me into.... second place... AGAIN!!!

Really having a lot of fun with Warhammer Underworlds at the moment... The obsession has lead me to LISTENING TO PODCASTS about Warhammer Underworlds - where I learned the player that one the Las Vegas Open a few weeks back - for the second time in a row - is from Calgary (for those that aren't Canadian, Calgary is the largest city in the prairie provinces of Western Canada, where I live. I've lived in Calgary, and a small town outside of Calgary, and it one of the places I visit the most - when I ever actually leave Saskatoon!?)