Mordheim

[Angel Barracks]

I have found someone to play with after about 2 years of buying a copy of the rules and then doing nothing.
So it is now full steam ahead…!!

Making my own bases and cutting off slottabase tabs and cutting away the cast on integral bases for some drilling and pinning action.

[miniaturemen]

Some nice looking minis there Mike. Would like to see them painted up and based.

Never played Mordheim as a miniatures game but really enjoyed it on the PlayStation.

 

[Angel Barracks]

Thanks!

I was looking at your site earlier for extra models!

[Darkest Star Games]

Ooo you lucky guy.  I’ve actually been considering pinging my homies to see if they’d want to get a campaign going, as I had found my old figs.  Maybe your progress will prompt me to light a fire under them.

"I saw this in a cartoon once, but I'm pretty sure I can do it..."

[Angel Barracks]

All based (making them took longer than expected) and ready for painting.

[Andrew Beasley]

I will assume ‘Sally’ is actually carrying the rations rather any other connotation 🙂

The work cutting the tabs off have certainly paid for itself – way more realistic.

[miniaturemen]

I like Martyn.

All they all GW minis?

[Angel Barracks]

Except for Sally yes.

Martyn is a favourite old model, from when GW had the Eternal Champion license.
That is Count Smiorgan Baldhead.

Markus is a bit of a conversion.

[Andrew Beasley]

You need one of these as a heavy hitter Sonic Sledgehammer YouTube

 

[Angel Barracks]

I have braved it.
Started painting my first 25mm in about 30 years.
Not great but a promising start…

If I leave my main man until last he should turn out ok by the time I have practiced on the rest.

[Steve Johnson]

Looks fine to me. One thing I’ve learnt is that a lot of the detail, shading etc we worry about simply disappears when on the table, no matter the scale. Of course when painting them you can’t help but do all the detail as it’s staring you in the face.

Based upon many a Mordheim campaign weekend at GW HQ over the years (which were fun and by and large nice people to play with, bar a few uber power players):

• Skaven armed with the free dagger and nothing else are hard to beat due to their speed, sheer numbers and cheapness.
• Witch Hunters in playtesting the rules were deemed too powerful and were tweaked, meaning they became one of the weakest. Shame as I loved their background fluff and played them most of the time, even reaching the final game one year.
• Armour is not worth having at the start and for quite some time. A weapon and the free dagger are the default options.
• Not all the scenarios in the rulebook play well. As I no longer have it I can’t remember which, were two were not really worth playing, unless you had the Skaven hordes mentioned above. Dwarves vs Skaven on the random treasure hunt type scenario was painful to play and I speak from bitter experience.

If playing these days I would not worry about having a warband that would be OK for fun comps, but go for ones that I enjoyed playing for their background story, plus try and come up with some narrative driven scenarios.

[Mike]

Steve Johnson wrote:

If playing these days I would not worry about having a warband that would be OK for fun comps, but go for ones that I enjoyed playing for their background story, plus try and come up with some narrative driven scenarios.

Yeah, I agree.
I bought a load of models I liked the vibe of, read the rules and worked out which of them I could use and then picked them.
TBH the ones I have are not what I would have liked, but then if I wanted a better warband I should not have chosen Stirland!!

I have not properly read the rules yet, but when I do I will try and remember your points!

🙂

[Steve Johnson]

My first warband were Dwarves with armour and shields, because I liked the figures I had and thought that’s how I would want to go into action. However they sucked as there were so few of them, were soooo slow and just couldn’t compete.

The second were the generic warband (the name escapes me completely) and I used converted LotR Orcs painted in an orange and blue colour scheme, with Dutch names. Fun to play and I had to get approval to use them from Jervis Johnson due to the licensing issues they had.

My favourites by far and away were the Witch Hunters, which I still have and were all converted 40K figures and they even won best painted warband at one of the tournaments!

I’d love to play again but I’d want a bit of command and control thrown in to mix things up a bit as it was too easy to plan your moves too far ahead, where a bit of ‘friction’ would have been nice. I think Frostgrave has improved upon Mordheim but I’m not a fan of the magic emphasis, but the rules themselves seem good.

[Andrew Beasley]

Good start – the eyes work well.

As a skaven fan I was surprised by how ‘over powered’ they where in the game (all that warpstone around I assume). Add a few slings and lots of troops make a force hard to beat – so much so you need to reduce their numbers for more fun.

As for playing the game – how about these two as opponents 😮

 

[Steve Johnson]

I used to see Tuomas now and then when I lived in Nottingham as I cycled home from work.

 

[Angel Barracks]

We played a test game today. The Stirland Cleric is pretty bad. The woodsmen with the 2 handed axes are poor. Very poor. My captain with a 2 handed weapon is poor.

Turns out double handed weapons are not good, and my ‘wizard’ is not good.
I love Stirland and want this to work, but I have been reading, double checking and asking around in Mordheim FB groups and alas I have had to retire my warband before we start.

I love the theme but after the play testing and feedback, it seems clear that I will struggle to win anything, which will make playing less fun.

So I am ‘resurrecting’ the warband Samantha was going to use.

I will be playing The Restless Dead…

[Andrew Beasley]

Oh dear – can you still use the figures under the ‘counts as’ rule?

 

[Angel Barracks]

Not sure what that is?

It is not the end of the world.
The undead will be quicker and easier to paint, and I still have WFB for my Stirland fix!

[mark leslie]

What kind of a World are we living in where Stirlanders are less than average?

It just ain’t right!

Fossilizing nicely.

[Steve Johnson]

In our games, as long as the figure broadly looked like it was armed as stated, then it was fine and you just told your opponent what they had. So your two handed swords and axes can become single handed ones and have the free dagger too when in combat. It makes it a lot easier as the characters progress as you don’t need to contantly keep adding or taking away weapons and kit. Hope that makes sense?

[Mike]

Ah, fair enough. But single handed ones means I lose the S bonus and I may as well not have the woodsmen hero models at all.
Which means not having some of the core essence of the lads.

No matter, Restless Undead it is.
And whilst I play those I will collect the old GW models to put together a Stir River Patrol warband that uses the Reikland warband rules.

Just a shame those old models I love are so expensive..

[Steve Johnson]

From memory at the start, it’s the number of attacks that make a difference, rather than any strength bonuses, hence the free dagger making a big difference. IIRC the axe reduces the armour save, but again no use early on. It can be very frustrating going with the feel of a warband only to find they stand little chance in a campaign, speaking from bitter experience.

[Mike]

Aye…

[Angel Barracks]

So…. I painted some Undead, played a game and they were much less crappy than the previous warband, potentially good enough I may be able to win some games!!
BUT…

They did not speak to me, so after much faffing about I have a plan.

I will use the Reikland warband rules but paint the troops as Stir River Patrol.
This means I can use Stirland colours and motifs without the huge problems the Stirland warband comes with.

I have all the models I need and have started painting them:

[Angel Barracks]

Not sure about the shield, but at long last the first guy is done…

[Steve Johnson]

Looks really good to me!

[Angel Barracks]

Changed the shield, happier now. Still not happy happy mind, but happier… I guess it is my first try so they can only get better…

[Angel Barracks]

Well that took a while, not sure I want to paint any more 28mm for a long time…

[Mike Headden]

Lovely looking stuff, Mike.

There are 100 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who can work from incomplete data

[Darkest Star Games]

They look great, Mike.  I love the skill on Felix’s shield, that’s ‘eavy Metal quality right there.

Some of those dudes look like they’re related.  Have you created the group’s fluff?

"I saw this in a cartoon once, but I'm pretty sure I can do it..."

[Steve Johnson]

Lovely work there Mike!

[Angel Barracks]

Darkest Star Games wrote:

I love the skill on Felix’s shield, that’s ‘eavy Metal quality right there.

Thanks, but it is just a decal I painted over to give it some depth, it was very flat otherwise.

Darkest Star Games wrote:

Have you created the group’s fluff?

Yes, but it currently resides in my head.

Darkest Star Games wrote:

Some of those dudes look like they’re related.

Spider and Heff are brothers.

[Angel Barracks]

Steve Johnson wrote:

Lovely work there Mike!

Grassy ass.

[Angel Barracks]

Mike Headden wrote:

Lovely looking stuff, Mike.

Ta!

[Angel Barracks]

Anyone bought these?

[Darkest Star Games]

Not those specific, but I have bought some Red Vectors items before and they’re pretty well done.

"I saw this in a cartoon once, but I'm pretty sure I can do it..."

[Angel Barracks]

Samantha and I played our first campaign game of MH just now.

 

I used the same warband as when I started at the club, despite its flaws. (The roster was already done and the models painted so it was easier)

I created Samantha’s warband as it will be the one I use at the club if we play again.

It has 5 heroes vs  my 2.

I won the scenario as she routed in the 4th turn but with my lowly 2 heroes vs her 5, she found loads more warpstone.

 

The buildings are not as fancy as Chris’s from the club but I will be jazzing them up a bit.
Though they are much easier to move around in than his 3d printed ones.
So practicality wins here I think.

Luckily Samantha was wary of committing her Vampire so I did not get to feel her undead wrath.

No OOA for me and of her 4 OOA. A ghoul and her Dire Wolfe were dead dead.
But with 5 heroes searching and 2 shards of warpstone from the scenario, she had enough gold to buy back the wolf and get a zombie and save stuff for a rainy day.

I just bought a new champion to bring my total of heroes to 3, though during the exploration one of my then 2 fell down a well and is missing the next game.

Just one quick photo for now until it all gets prettier.

[Darkest Star Games]

Good show on your part to win despite the hero disparity!  Though break on the the well fall though (hopefully not permanent break!).

If these buildings end up close to the finish of your others then they’ll be very nice indeed.

"I saw this in a cartoon once, but I'm pretty sure I can do it..."

[Author]

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