Night of the Living Lead 2024: an Oldhammer horror story

How's everyone been? I've been a long time silent on this blog, still getting some hobby stuff done but until recently mostly been drowning in work. Anyway, a bit of an Oldhammer horror story for you...

Couple of weeks ago, I head down to the Foundry for the annual "Night of the Living Lead" Little Albion game. The scenario is based on the theme of Gathering Winter Fuel... or rather stopping peasants from gathering it for free. I've taken a High Elf warband along - Kieran the Prudent and his Forestry Commission - to support Lord Watalouse in his objective of bringing fiscal responsibility in the realm. (Many thanks to Tom Reynolds for the photos of my warband in action!)

Fun times with great people, as always.

A few days later, I'm heading back to Orkney. It's been a long train ride up from England to Scotland, and then the Scotrail to Aberdeen. But finally I'm on the ferry home.

I reach into my backpack... and realise I've left my minis on the train.

I'd had to lay the backback down, so I took the box of minis out to keep it from being tipped on its side, and just sat it down on the luggage rack next to my backpack. I'd grabbed the backpack in Aberdeen, but forgot the minis. Shit shit shit shit.

My mind's whirring, and I ring Aberdeen lost property. I try and give the dimensions of the box. They rush out to check the luggage rack as the train's about to head back to Edinburgh. Nope, they couldn't see it, but they didn't have long to look. Try again when it gets to Edinburgh. Edinburgh's system is much more beauraucratic, I have to fill in a form. That just generates an email saying that nothing of that description has been handed in. My heart is sinking at this stage.

But still, I don't want to give up hope. So the next day I phone Aberdeen again. I describe my box (small, cardboard). The lady on the other end says, could you say something more to identify it... well, I explain, there's a bag of dice sitting on a layer of tissue, and beneath that that layer of tissue there are 15 painted toy soldiers. There's a pause and I realise she's actually got the box there and is opening it up. I hear a bit of a chuckle on the other end. "Yes, we have your lost property here." Apparently they'd gone up and down between Edinburgh and Aberdeen about four times, just sitting on the luggage rack until the end of the day when the cleaners found the box up there and handed it in.

And so this Tuesday I was finally passing through Aberdeen station again and go go to lost property and reclaim the box.

14 High Elves and a temple dog, back home again. A happy ending!

The Swan Ship

The Guardian of the Shifting Isles continues his lonely exile, his only companion the enchanted ship Eala.

I'm taking part in Snickit's "Odds and Sods Oldhammer Painting Challenge", the goal of which is to get us to tackle our leadpile and get paint on things that have been waiting for it for too long. For November the theme was grandeur - and the more I thought about it, the more I realised the time had come to tackle The Swan Ship by Tom Meier, a Thunderbolt Mountain limited edition from 1989 I believe. I bought this for my Sea Elves back in... 2014 I think? Unassembled in its box but at a very reasonable price (before the inflation really took hold of Oldhammer prices). However, at the time I was wary of painting it. I just didn't think I could do it justice. It's been with me through 3 house moves since, and every time my eldest has seen it over the past 8 years, he's asked me when I'm finally going to paint it. So he helped me out with the assembly - only fitting given that it's been sitting around in its box for the majority of his life.

Those of you familiar with the model will spot that I haven't gone with the original passenger Tom Meier sculpted for the Swan Ship. As you can see on the box here, it comes with an Elven Princess - and the boxed set includes a story by Richard S. Kerr to explain the tale of how the Swan Ship came to be and the Princess' voyage in search of true love.

I switched her out for two reasons. First, the Princess is so tiny as to be out of scale with all of the rest of my minis; secondly, I want to field the Swan Ship on the battlefield, so went for a more martial - though still suitable - captain of the Swan Ship. So I chose one of the three "Elven Kings" by Tom Meier - another Thunderbolt Mountain limited edition set (from 1988) waiting for paint - to stand on deck.

Having finally painted one, I thought it was rude not to get the other two Elven Kings in the set ready for battle, so here they are - just finished today.

Anyway, happy Christmas to everyone! I have a seasonal battle report which hopefully I'll be able to share before the end of 2022, but in the meantime, I hope everybody has a wonderful and blessed Christmas Day!

Liberating the Badlands

"Father! Father! I bring wonderful news! We have been liberated!"

The old blind man laughed. "Liberated, you say? Oh my dear girl, I would not be so sure."

"But father, surely anything is better than being overrun and enslaved by Orcs?"

"Before the Orcs, my girl, it was the army of the Duke. His brigands ransacked our chapel while he claimed Droit du Seigneur. And before them it was the sneering Elves. Were we anything more than slaves to them while they obsessed night and day uncovering ancient ruins? And before them, how many were driven mad by the cults of strange gods? Oh, my dear, I have seen too many liberators in my time. What is the difference between one occupying army and another?"

The door swung open. A fat soldier with a scar across the right side of his face stood in the doorway barking. "This house is now commandeered for the army of the Emperor. Woman! My men are hungry. Bring us food and bring us ale."

The old blind man sat and said nothing. He knew one thing: this would not be the last army to liberate their town.

While we're all locked away at home, one of the things that keeps us going is dreaming about the games we might play in the future. Which is why I've been getting so excited about Benjamin May's planned campaign weekend using the Warhammer 5th Edition campaign rules. 5th edition was the edition I played in my youth and some of my best gaming memories are of the Southport GW summer campaign back in 1998, so this will be a nice nostalgia trip for me as and when it happens. I wrote a couple of microstories for the campaign pack, so I thought I'd stick them up here.

We'll be campaigning in the Badlands, amidst the ruins of the Kingdom of Strygos, and in search of the legendary Doomstones!

He surveyed the barren lands that stretched out before him. Clotted rivers through fetid swamp. In the distance, twisted mountains. Who would lay claim to such a hellhole? But he knew these lands had secrets. Ancient monuments, forgotten temples.

Were the historians to be believed? If the stories were a lie, this expedition had been in vain. They had doomed themselves for nothing. But... what if the stories were true? What then? Even thinking about it made his heart race. The four stones, the four great crystals of legend. Whoever had them had the power to bend the fates to their will.

Of course, he had been sent to bring the doomstones back to his patron. But once he had them in his possession, who could stand in his way? Then he would have no need to bow and grovel before any patron. All time and space would grovel before him! For a moment he sat there, staring into the distance, lost in a kind of reverie. Then, coming to his senses, he gave the signal to his troops to advance.

In my teenage years, my only army was the High Elves, and so in returning to 5th edition, I wasn't going to miss this chance to restore my High Elves to their former glory! The only problem is that my collection is split between my childhood home in Liverpool and my current home in Orkney, and most of my old High Elf army is down in Liverpool. And of course I want to start getting ready now... So for that reason I'm going to use the minis I have here as the heart of the army, giving me a reason to finally get some paint on them: a unit of White Lions, a handful of archers (the old Melnibonean models), and a Great Owl (counts as Great Eagle).

I'll also be able to call on support from my Sea Elves if needed, but what's a new challenge without new minis to paint! And those White Lions have been waiting for paint since 1998, which is tragic in itself...

Hopefully I'll have some painted models to show you soon enough, and I can start telling the story of this army.

I'm not dead! (Happy New Year...)

I realise it's been a long silence on this blog. While I'd love to claim that although I've been quiet online, in real life I've been more involved in wargaming than ever, that'd be a lie. In fact, I only played one game in the whole of 2018... the Battle of Gallow Cross in Warlord Paul's Daggervale Campaign, a bloody mess of a battle against Nik Dixon's Skaven - my Sea Elves held back the tide of vermin with minimal rank and file causalities (though the loss of all nobles, who nobly sacrificed themselves), but not before the blighted ones had gnawed their way through the civilian population we'd allegedly arrived to help.



So if it wasn't much of a year for gaming, what about for painting? In fact, beyond tidying up the Sea Elves (which I'd more or less finished for BOYL2017, but in a rush), the only miniatures I painted from scratch in 2018 were the two creepy weirdos from the Circus of Corruption. This is a pretty appalling state of affairs, but unfortunately I'm not the kind of person who finds it easy to paint unless I have a game to prepare for. And living up in Orkney at the moment, there aren't many games to prepare for (especially seeing as my research means that I usually miss BOYL... though hopefully not this coming year).

What I really need to do is find some oldhammery wargamers in Scotland, as I'm regularly down in Fife with my work. Or get people to come for a wargames weekend up here on Orkney (come on, you know you want to!)

But of course, there's an even more obvious solution to my gaming and painting drought. More games with my son (and my missus if she's interested). Which is why at this very moment the smell of primer is in the air...

What on earth are those blurry blobs, I hear you ask? Now, even with such a dreadfully blurry photo, it should be fairly obvious to every gamer of a certain age what those minis are and what they represent. Yep, I think it's time I introduced my family to the sublime joy that is HeroQuest!

Happy New Year to you all!

Battle Report: Assault on Fort Labger

Fimir? In Mongolia? Naturally.

As many of you will know, I was gutted to miss BOYL this year. Even though I was excited to head out to Mongolia for a couple of months, it still hurt to know what I was missing back home. But I was determined not to let the summer pass without any gaming, so I decided to take along a handful of figures with me to introduce my young lad James to the joys of rolling dice. He's already been indoctrinated via fighting fantasy, but this was the first time that I've played toy soldiers with him. We took along with us a floor plan of a castle that comes from a cardboard pop-out castle, with the idea that we could have a couple of simple "siege" style games. Ruleset? 3rd edition of course. Although mostly we just rolled lots of dice and moved the toys around.


The fimm of Clan Slea advance on the abandoned fort of Labger, hoping to establish a new stronghold for themselves. They are led by the warlord Gislea, and accompanied by a carrion crawler. A small and desperate band of elves and gnomes heard news of the advance of the vile fimir, and have barracaded themselves inside the fort to stop it falling into the wrong hands. (Why the fort of Labger? Quite simply, that was the name my son James chose for it because we were playing the game inside the "lab ger". A ger being what the Mongolians call yurts; and this was the ger that had been set up as a lab for the archaeologists to process their finds. Except they couldn't while we were playing, because we'd taken up the entire desk with our game. Scholarship be damned. Anyway, here's my son James pondering his strategy.)


While the fimir split up into two parties, one to try and gain entrance by the west gate, and one to gain entrance by the east gate, the Carrion Crawler seems more interested in the picnicking knight he's spied, and takes a closer look.


The one eyed menace (the fimir, not my son; he has two eyes) advances along the paths on either side of the castle, seemingly oblivious to the hail of bolts and arrows raining down on them from the ramparts.


The defenders try their best to hold the attackers back at the gates. They've not had a chance to reinforce the defences since their rushed occupation of the fort, and the fimir are using all their brute strength to try and smash through.


At the west gate, the fimir break through. However, with the group already weakened by the effects of elven longbows, they find themselves cut down. The one remaining fimm warrior is pushed back, what remains of the splintered gate slammed in his face and hastily barracaded shut.


To the east, however, the fimir are more successful, rampaging through the gate, through the defenders, and into the fort.


Meanwhile in the moat the carrion crawler, having feasted on knight, decides to spit out the vegetable portion of his picnic.


The battle rages on. The gnomes in particular fare badly, the club tails of the fimir smashing in their skulls. What's worse, the carrion crawler has also spread its path of pestilence to the fort. But then... what's this? The carrion crawler decides to turn on its patrons. (A twist in the tale here from James as he decides that the crawly thing is fed up being bossed around by the fimir!)


The battle turns; the fimm warriors lie betrayed and slain, and the carrion crawler turns its attention to the remaining warrior arriving as a reinforcement (the survivor from the west gate who has made his way all the way around to the east gate).


The warlord Gislea, severely wounded by the elven warriors, flees. The fort of Labger is safe. For now.




All in all, a fun little game in an exotic locale with just a few models and a fold out floor plan. A nice introduction to the rules for James, who got into the spirit of things with a couple of nice storytelling flourishes which really made the game. We decided that the fimir would not give up that easily, and so the siege continues...

Battle Report: Ambush at Logan's Way; or, Fighting Nemo

In which Lenihan's expeditionary force, finding themselves waylaid by the dastardly Clan Snickit, call upon the aid of some unusual allies...

Last sunday saw the first meeting of OGRE (Oldhammer Gamers, Region: East Anglia), one of the regional groups that has recently sprung from the womb of the fertile Oldhammer movement. We benefited from the kind hospitality of the Cambridge City Wargames Club, who had booked the scout hut in Logan's Way, Cambridge, for the whole day, and soon the room was ablaze with 3rd edition Warhammer action: Dwarves vs Wood Elves, Brettonians vs Orcs and Goblins, and High/Sea Elves vs Skaven (not to mention the 2nd edition 40k game going on at the same time). This battle report will detail one of those games; an ambush scenario, with my elven troops deployed in marching order in the centre of the table, with Skaven converging around them. All credit to my opponent, who in the best spirit of Oldhammer accomodated my narrative whims (I can't just have a normal battle, can I?) and, as we shall see made great sacrifices in order to ensure that we both had a good game. He also provided the pics for this battle report (more can be found on his blog Snickit's Tail). See, these Skaven get a bad press, don't they? They're much more generous and honourable than we've been led to believe. Seems they're the victim of malicious propaganda! Ok, on with the report.

The march home, mile after mile, day after day. Movement without moving. The same hills, the same trees, the same rocks, again and again, the monotony of the landscape driving you mad. Until finally you see it in front of you, beckoning: the sea. And beyond the sea, home. The waiting ship, the chance for a tired army to sail away and put these lands behind them.

In the midst of the joy and relief, who was the first to notice that they were not alone? Was it the sea elf priest Nemo who first recognised the scratches and high pitched skittering? Was it the sorceress Serellia who saw the rodents scuttling from behind the trees? Was it the commander Lenihan, at the front of the column, who became aware of the rat ogres climbing the hill ahead of them?

Suddenly a noise from behind - two sharp blasts, like cracks of thunder.

(Sidebar: ok ok, I think it's only fair I come clean here. Initially, as can be seen in the pictures above, my Skaven opponent had placed not 2, but 4 jezzails on the hill behind my marching column. In the first turn, all of them rolled to hit, and it quickly became clear that the game was going to be a short lived one; the perfect storm of my deployment in column (due to the nature of the scenario), the proximity of my troops to the jezzails (again due to the nature of the scenario), and, of course, him rolling all 4 to hit, led to him completely wiping out two of my units - and without even bothering to roll for casualties on my shore riders (who would very likely all have been wiped out as well), my opponent suggested, very sportingly, that we should start again. I suggested that we should play with exactly the same starting deployment, except with him fielding only 2 jezzails on the hill behind my marching column instead of 4 so as to give me at least a chance of survival, and being a gentleman, my opponent agreed. Obviously all credit goes to him for ensuring that we both had a fun game that lasted beyond the first turn! And that's the spirit of Oldhammer in a nutshell. More important for both parties to have a fun game than for one to win at all costs. Anyway, the damage inflicted by two jezzails was quite enough, as we shall see...)

While cool heads kept their eyes forward, some of the elves span round to see where the blast had come from. They saw the two jezzails on the hill behind them, heard the screeching laughter of the rats, and, with horror, realised that their brothers in arms lay dead or dying on the ground beside them. Before they had even had a chance to come to terms with what was happening, further casualties were inflicted by a warpfire thrower on the right flank. The sea elf company, the column of warriors, the shore riders, all smashed in a second of smoke and blood. The elven force found itself reduced to half its original strength.

Meanwhile, in the midst of the chaos the sea elf priest Nemo was chanting invocations, calling upon the gods of the oceans to send aid in this moment of trial. His prayers were not in vain: rising from the rock pools came the warriors of the depths - monstrous crabs, man of war jellyfish, squid, even a mighty and fearsome seahorse. The denizens of the waters had answered Nemo's call to arms. The skaven would not just be fighting Nemo and the sea elves; they would be fighting the sea itself.
Sea gribblies come to our aid

Seeing the diseased rat scum close in on all sides, Lenihan gave the order to his shore riders to charge the Rat Ogres and clear the way.

In order to minimise further casualties from the jezzails, the rest of the troops fanned out before advancing. Raising their bows, the sea elf company and the warriors peppered the skaven forces with arrows, but luck was against them, and their aim was wayward. The bolt thrower too, whose crew had stayed behind in order to hold off the attacking forces, missed its target. Yet the battle was not yet a lost cause; the sight of two great eagles swooping towards them caused a block of the foul clanrats to turn and flee, while Lenihan and the shore riders found themselves able to push the rat ogres back.
The situation after the charge phase during my first turn; note the clanrats fleeing from the eagles, and the ogres engaged by the shore riders; but also note the massive depletion in number after the jezzails and warpfire throwers blasted our troops

The rats, so used to stripping the flesh from the bodies of the dead, were no strangers to the foul craft of necromancy. The sea elves might have called on the creatures of the ocean for help; but Clan Snickit had raised its own allies from the ground, using their dark arts to animate a fearsome cohort of skeletons. The sight of these skeletons closing in terrified the bolt thrower crew; deciding that it was better to be the last of a dying race than to join a dead race, they abandoned their brave stance holding off the enemy, and ran like hell, leaving the bolt thrower behind. The unit of elven warriors, still reeling from the casualties inflicted by the Skaven war machinery in the first moments of battle, found itself charged and pushed back by the stench of a block of clanrats. The shore riders, led by Lenihan, fared better, slaying all three of the rat ogres and leaving their cowardly handlers to flee.

The battle now hung in the balance, as Lenihan and the shore riders swung round to return to the aid of those brave elves who survived; to the east, the allies of the sea had caused the Clan Snickit gutter runners to flee - but to the west, the unit of elven warriors found itself completely destroyed, overrun by the numeric superiority of the clanrats.

The jezzails hoped to repeat its trick of decimating the elven battle line; but this time one of them overheated and exploded, while the other missed. The warpfire thrower proved more reliable, toasting one of the eagles and leaving the battlefield bathed in a smell not entirely unlike fried chicken.
I feel like eagle tonight, like eagle tonight...

It was perhaps in the excitment of this slaughter that Clan Snickit began to fall into disorder. The unit of Clanrats to the east attempted to turn to face the approaching shore riders; but amidst the noise of battle and the distracting scent of roast eagle, the order was lost, and the Clanrats were left with their flank exposed. It was single moment of weakness, but one which the elves sought to seize upon.
The shore riders charged the clanrats in the flank; in spite of this, the clanrats held. But the sight of the remaining great eagle swooping towards them was too much. Now, the clanrats fled, and in the hurry to leave the battle field, much rodent blood was spilled.

The sea creatures too did their work, sending the crew of a warpfire thrower into flight. Hope began to rise in the hearts of the surviving elves; could they outmaneuvre Clan Snickit and reach their ships?

It would take something dramatic to stop the elves now. The remaining warpfire thrower could not inflict a further hit on the sea elf company. But the crew of the remaining jezzail saw their opportunity. They could hardly believe their luck; the exposed flank of the shore riders, who had been pursuing the clanrats. A single shot in the flank could rip through each and every one of the riders. It would be risky... one jezzail had already overheated... but the opportunity could not be lost. The jezzail team took aim... fired... and missed.

Desperate times called for desperate measures, and Clan Snickit's shaman called a clap of thunder from the skies in the hope that the shore riders' horses and the sea creatures would take fright; yet amidst the roar of battle, a single clap of thunder was hardly noticed.

At this stage, the elves were in a position to make good their escape.

The skaven could try and chase (cue the Benny Hill music), but their chance to close in around the elves and stop them in their tracks had been lost. The remaining jezzail, spying a chance to cook some more eagle, took aim with one last desperate shot, and finally exploded.

The threat had passed. Lenihan and the elven survivors had escaped from the claws and teeth of the foul clan snickit. But aboard their elven longship at last, there was no mood for songs of celebration and victory. The casualties had been too great. Too many lives lost. Too many left to rot on a foreign shore.

The Oldhammer Weekend: Rumble in the Jungle Battle Report

"Archaeology is destruction" - Mortimer Wheeler

We came from across the sea. Not to plunder, only to excavate. Drawn in not by greed, but by curiosity. Drawn into the valley. Towards the temples. Towards death.

This is an account of the wonderful game GMed by Padre at the recent Bring Out Your Lead! Oldhammer weekend at the Foundry, Nottingham, the background for which I outlined in the previous post of this blog. Two fantastic reports of the battle have already been provided: Padre's own battle report and an account by Citadel Collector, who organised the events and random encounters in the scenario. (I've nicked their photos for this battle report. So if you're getting a sense of deja-vu, it might be because you've seen many of these pics already). Their accounts are truly wonderful, but make the terrible mistake of focussing on the action at the north end of the table, where substantial forces of Orcs, Chaos, and Amazons were actually managing to get into the temples and steal treasure. For my Elves, valiantly battling for survival at the south end of the table, it was as though this skirmish was not even taking place (though they couldn't help hearing the terrifying sound of a Norse giant screaming like a girl as it hotlegged it out of the valley). So here is the story of the true battle; the one that really matters... (Or, to put it another way, if you want the full story go and read what Padre or Citadel Collector have to say... if you want to hear me wittering on about my own toy soldiers to the exclusion of everything meaningful that actually took place, then read on, oh discerning reader!)



The ship had not set out in search of battle. The ship had set out in search of antiquities. They had not counted on the forces of the Dagyoto tribe, dwellers in the valley for generations, guards of the mysteries of the temple. Defenders of the temples; photo by Padre
Lenihan's expeditionary force; photo by Padre

Entering the valley from the south, the Elven forces advanced towards the nearest temple, which according to the sorceress Serellia was "bathed in the sweet odour of antiquity".

How she had managed to discern this through the stench of the corpses that lay between the force and the temple was anyone's guess. Corpses of a previous company of fools who had tried to raid the temples. Corpses clothed in a blanket of maggots and flies. Corpses that were slowly moving forwards. Moving forwards in attack. Gathering his resolve and the resolve of his cavalry, Lenihan gave the order to charge the shambling dead. Shore riders (actually 5th ed Reaver Knights) vs Zombie Pirates; photo by Citadel Collector

In the east, eagles swept past a unit of boar-riding natives: a warning blow, a statement of intent. First blood. Would the pygmies be disuaded from putting up a fight, and return to their ramshackle huts? It seemed unlikely. Eagles strike a glancing blow; photo by Citadel Collector

Suddenly, a temple guard materialised, summoned from the depths of time by forces unknown, brought into this age to stop those who sought to defile the temples - flickering for only the briefest of seconds before being cast away into eternity by a volley of elven arrows and a sea elf ballista bolt. Blinking in the harsh light of the southlands sun, the expeditionary force began to ponder whether they were trespassing on land forbidden by the ancients. Caution was clearly required.
Temple guard, we hardly knew you; photo by Citadel Collector

Combat between Lenihan's shore riders and the stinking dead continued; more animated bodies rising from the ground to swell the number of attackers, only to collapse in instability. The battle was slow, grim, and smelly. Lenihan and his shore riders eventually dealt with the threat with minimal casualities; yet the conflict had left the cavalry in disorder, badly needing to regroup. They were now rather vulnerable to the valley's defensive force; not only had the diminutive Dagyoto natives released three great hammer-tailed lizards from their pen - the shore riders could also see three giant gorrilas stomping in their direction, while boar mounted natives prepared to charge.

Sometimes the most courageous thing a general can do is give the order to withdraw, retreat, and regroup. Who but a coward allows his soldiers to die simply for his own pride, when the greater tactical advantage can be gained by turning and running? And so, when receiving a charge from the great gorrilas, weighing up the risk that his cavalry could very easily find itself subsequently charged on both flanks, Lenihan made the tactically sound decision that the riders should flee. Flee in a controlled, discipined, and efficient manner. It was in this way that they would demonstrate the martial excellence of Ulthuan. Thus they bravely ran away.

By the time that Lenihan decided that it was once again strategically sound to turn and face the enemy, the expeditionary force found themselves in a tight and well organised battle line, with each unit's flanks covered. There was only one problem - they had hardly made any progress towards the temples. They were, more or less, back at the point where they had started.

Giving the order to pick off what remained of the temple defences, Lenihan and the shore riders now charged the hammer-tailed lizards, while sea elf bows and bolt throwers sent a skirmishing unit of natives into flight, before turning their attention to the giant gorrilas. Two fell to the arrows and bolts; the remaining gorrila ran and hid. Bet they won't see me here... Photo by Citadel Collector

Up to this point, the elves had suffered only minor casualties, while efficiently picking off those who stood in their way. There was little to disuade their curiosity. Their luck, however, was about to turn dramatically.

Lenihan and his shore riders were caught in conflict with the hammer-tailed lizards (while all the while the natives in charge of the lizard pen hid and took bets on the outcome). The conflict ground slowly, with the elven blades doing little to pierce the scaly skin of the reptiles. Shore riders vs hammertail lizards; first photo by Citadel Collector, second by Padre

Suddenly, the pygmy hotpot catapult - which had previously restricted its activities to splattering stew across the battlefield in a seemingly random manner - found its target at the heart of the unit of sea elves. No sooner had the elven crew shaken off the shock of being hit by a pot of the most unrefined food it had been their misfortune to encounter (only the finest silver service is provided on board elven ships), they were hit in the face by a second pot. Only a single rank of the sea elves survived the unwelcome meal. Pygmy hotpot catapult; an ingenious use of the trees at the top of the temple. Photo by Citadel Collector.

Meanwhile, the unit of elven warriors steadied themselves to receive a charge by pygmies on boars. The great eagles, swinging round to glance blows at the tiny porcine-mounted natives, did little to diminish their number. The elven warriors found themselves pushed back... and back... and back... until they turned and ran, driven off the valley and back to their ships. And to think we never got to use that battering ram; photo by Warlord Paul

This was only meant to be an archaeological dig. Things were going badly wrong for the would-be antiquaries.

Day was closing. But rising high above the valley, the eagles saw that which the entire elf force had failed to notice - all the while Lenihan's forces had been engaging with the temple's defenders in the south, at the north end of the valley, brutish forces had managed to break into the temples and were heading off with precious artifacts.

The eagles swooped, talons ready to snatch the ill-gotten plunder from the hands of the uncivilised brutes - only to find themselves smashed into the side of the mountain by a blast of wind from a greenskinned shaman.
The north end of the table (not featured in most of this highly selective battle report!), where the other forces had actually managed to get their grubby hands on treasure. Note the eagles after their failed attempt to grab the treasure. Photo by Citadel Collector

So near and yet so far. The Elven survivors; photo by Citadel Collector



All in all, a fun game. Many many thanks to Padre and everyone else involved! A perfect reintroduction to gaming in general, and a wonderful introduction to 3rd ed and the joys of GMed gaming. I chose a very conservative strategy, perhaps overly cautious - in a sense I felt this was in character (would an elven general sacrifice his kindred's lives for the cause of, in effect, an archaeological expedition? Doubtful.), although maybe as a 3rd ed novice I took the caution a wee bit too far. I think that the scenario was a great one, really captured my imagination. If I was to make two comments on the design, they would be: 1) it didn't require a table quite as long as was used; and the length of the table made it a little unlikely forces in the north and the south would encounter one another; and 2) possibly the events and random encounters came a bit infrequently and needed to be forced in the later turns of the game - I get the feeling that there were a lot of exciting encounters that never got to be used! However, these are minor points, as in general I massively enjoyed myself. Great gaming, great company, and the highlight of a fine weekend's gaming, drinking, and reimmersing myself in the world of Warhammer!

You might expect me to be turning over the tactics I used in my head, pondering where it went wrong, how I could have got to the temple, made it out with the treasure and won the game. However, my mind has been taxed with a far more pressing puzzle: does Nottingham REALLY need an all-night Greggs? And does that all-night Greggs REALLY need not one, but two bouncers?