Ta'Khal pulled the rotten maggot from his beard and chewed it like a toffee as he shielded his eyes and looked over the battlefield. Something was bothering him, and he did not like this. It was a feeling, one he did not like.....a need that was driving him onwards. After the last battle, he was gifted with a vision, and he know knew his need would be met in Montagne. A small town, idyllic, and stable, but harboring an incredible secret. The horrible Monks of Morr had used ancient rituals in their Monastery to ward off the effects of chaos. The God's would not let this stand. And he was being sent to ensure that these monks and their villagers would pay for the great curing!
He knew that others were on their way, trying to claim the souls that would be his for Nurgle. These interlopers would have to pay, and he smiled as he thought of the great infections boiling in his gut, ready to be launched at these misunderstanding mortal Champions.
He grunted at Mal'gore, leader of his beast retinue, who howled out at his beast brethren, chortling new orders as they started heading North towards Montagne....and a date with blood and pestilence under the eyes of the gods......
Hello! The Warbands of Chaos Game at The Oldhammer USA event in Baltimore is basically a mass Realm of Chaos game, where mighty (or not so mighty) Champions of Chaos will fight for greater glory, rewards, gifts with mass mayhem and bloodshed designed to draw the Eyes of their respective Chaos Gods! In general, it is based on Orlygg's Warband event at the first BOYL event in the UK, last year. (What our event is kinda based on, after all!). So first off - BIG THANK YOU TO JAMES. Anyone playing his game will hopefully see a lot of similarities in the rules, and thank James for letting me swipe 'em!
Our game is basically a gigantic game for multiple players, where players can take part, even leave and come back later, but in general just have a great time mashing our warbands together. Rusty Gouldman has been kind enough to build the terrain, and will be heading up the game with me. He is working on some great stuff, and he told me he's sending pictures soon, so I can't wait! But the battlefield will be a large rectangular field with several buildings (more later), villagers and some great details. One way to think of this is as a Big Game (from the Game Days of yore) Skirmish game (though units can move as units as well). As you are making your warband, remember to review The Restrictions of the Gods at the bottom of this post.
The Basic Rules
- Players form a warband using Realms of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness or Realms of Chaos: Lost and the Damned. See below for The Restrictions of the Gods. Also you can see previous posts which cover some of the charts that you will need, as well as the rolls for each level of Champion here.
- Players should strive to paint their warbands to the best of their ability (it is a few models after all). Their Champions should have their names painted on their bases (or cards or labels of some sort so their opponents can keep a list of their foes!) We should also all try to come up with a narrative story for their warband (this is not required), but will make it a lot better. you can see something along these lines in Gaj's incredible Ellen Degenerate here.
- Players will join the game by setting up in their patron deities start point (or in any start point if they are undivided or Malal ;) ). They will then join the turn sequence. Players can join at any time, and can remove themselves by leaving the board at any time, but must move their models off the board (unless they are killed - or people end up chasing "ghost models"). Players can rejoin, or even come in with a different warband, but Reward Points scored for their warband are per warband, not per player (Deity Points are awards throughout game play and are not reduced at any time)
- A player may only field ONE warband at any one time. Though on the
withdrawal or destruction of a player's warband the player may
re-enter the game with a new warband that can be of any chaotic power.
So if you wish to field both Khorne or Slannesh warbands during the
game, you can, though just not at the same time.
- Models can be treated as character
models (they move independently) or as units. Units can be mixed on
racial grounds, so dwarfs, goblins and skaven all in one unit is fine,
with the restriction that movement will be calculated by the slowest
moving member of the unit and that base sizes need to be consistent with
the unit as a whole. All models are moved in the turn sequence for that player.
- We will keep track of Deity Points (to see which god is ahead), and Warband Points. These will be awarded for actions in the game, such as killing an enemy follower (1 pt) or an enemy Champion (5 points). For your Champions, these will allow you to add rewards and gifts after the game (but I hope you don't turn into a Chaos Spawn!)
- There will also be a number of villager and monk models running around the board during this scenario. If you can kill/capture/enthrall/infect (by basically running these models down) you will earn Eye of the Gods Points, and if you can capture or subdue 5 of these models, then you can earn an Immediate Reward by rolling on the Chaos Rewards Chart. There will be several of these models, and they may appear or reappear at different times (as decided by a chart that Rusty and I will have).
- Upon the death of a Champion the player can;
A) Remove their warband from the field - this will represent them
fleeing as individuals, or slipping way to join the retinues of
successful warbands after the battle. The player could then decide to
field a new warband to the same, or different, chaos god.
B) Nominate a model to 'take command' of their warband. I am sure that
all forces would have a second in command waiting in the wings, and
Chaos Warbands would be no different. The character would receive an
'instant' reward of a chaos weapon (or take the weapon previously used
by the champion), chaos armour or random chaos attribute depending on a
D6 dice roll. 1-3: Chaos Attribute, 4-5: Chaos Armour and 6: Chaos
Weapon.
C) Use the Skeleton Champion rules to 'raise' their champion from death.
To use this rule you will need an undead model to represent your
Champion in his undead form. So, if you are hoping to use this strategy,
plan ahead a choose an appropriate model.
- A sample of the action list is something like this:
Champion killing a follower of another god = 1 reward point
Champion killing a champion of another god = 5 reward points
Champion killing a monster (e.g. anything on a 40mm/50mm square base) = 3 points
Champion of Khorne killing a Champion of Slannesh = 10 reward points
Champion of Slannesh killing a Champion of Khorne = 10 reward points
Khorne Champion killing an ally. = 3 reward points
Slannesh Chmp. killing through pleasure (acquiescence spell, chaos weapon etc) = 3 pt Nurgle Champ killing through disease (nurgle rot, spells etc.) = 3 pt
Tzeentch Champ Killing With Magic = 3 pt
An extra ten points can be earned if you show up with Rick Priestley or Bryan Ansell!
(Note if anyone chooses to bring an Undead Champion, then dead models will not earn these points, except for the Undead Champion himself. 20 points earned in this battle will equal one roll on the Rewards Chart. Only the greatest champions can be rewarded!)
The Scenario
The Call has brought you and your warband, oozing with need by your patron God to claim the lives of the treacherous Monks of Morr at Montagne. The villagers flitting between haystacks and buildings also drive your need for revenge. But as you approach this doomed Burg, you notice others that have arrived. Your need drives you to be the greatest Champion on this day, and you launch forth to crush the others.......as the Eyes of the Gods turn to the battlefield you stride upon......
Players will setup for this game at one of the four table edges (each deity will have a set-up area, to be determined randomly on the day. Also, these will remain set-up zones for further warbands throughout the day similar to spawning grounds in video games). Undivided players will select whichever setup zone they like, but once chosen they have decided on their "side"for the day.
The turn sequence will proceed as normal (as a Big Game), except instead of Players it will go Khorne's turn, Nurgle's turn, etc. This will also be decided when the Setup zones are established. If at any time in the game any one god is not represented, we will skip that "Phase", but if someone joins it will return to the sequence.
There will be several monks and villagers running around the town, fields or monastery. These are the victims of your driven need, as you must crush, seduce, infect or just outright kill these lost souls and claim the source of power inside. Their destruction is the driving focus of the great God's Will, and it is the reason they have sent their minions to judge all of you inspiring Chaos Champions. Collect as many of these models as you can, but moving your models (either in skirmish or as a unit) into base to base with them. If you use a ranged attack to kill or subdue them, realize you still have to touch the models, so wily champions going after you could recover them if you aim too far!
The battle will end by mutual consent of the players, or at the end of
an agreed time limit or when the narrative has reached a natural end - either there is only one Champion left on the table (and no new players join) or the Monks and Villagers have all been punished for their misdeeds or the store approaches closing (or Tom kicks us out). The main goals are listed below in Winning and Losing the game
Winning and Losing the Game
In theory, all contributors of the game are winners. After all, you will
have the experience of fighting a narrative battle with a lovingly
created warband with a rich backstory developed by you. After the
battle, you will have plenty of material to take the story of your force
further.
The game will be played on the Saturday, probably beginning in the
morning after much faffing about and chatting. There will be an agreed
break in the game for lunch (approx 1 hour) and will continue as long as
necessary.
However, there will be three winners of sorts.
1) The winning side, Nurgle, Slannesh, Tzeentch or Khorne, established by the side with the highest number of Deity Reward Points.
2) The winning champion, who can be drawn from any Power, will have the
HIGHEST number of Warband Reward Points and is still on the field at the end of
the battle.
3) All players in the game will be able to vote
on their favorite warband (painting or theme) to win the Best in Show
warband. The player with the most votes will win, with any tie being
decided by one of our Golden Gobbo judges.
More
One thing missing for now is a map of the battlefield. Until Rusty has completed the board, I do not want to draw it all out, but it should mostly match the Monastery board from the 3rd edition rulebook, as Rusty is trying to replicate the monastery for our game! But it will include, regular terrain types as well as the village and the Monastery itself!
Also, I have tried to be careful, but if anyone has questions and I think they need to be added, I will edit this and add to it as we need to (so new readers will not need to ask again), but do check the comments to see if your question has been answered. Not all good ideas may be chosen, but please, anything to add may help us have a better game. Also, any input form James or any of the BOYL guys (including Marcus because I think he is running the new one?) that can help, it will be appreciated! I also want to update my storyline, and will be editing a new version when I can, but I do not want to delay this anymore....so a better story intro will have to be added later. Please forgive me.
So this is the game as it stands now. Any changes will be added here, and only after discussions under this in the comments. I think this will be an incredible game on the day, and we will be taking at least one lunch break (and dinner break if it goes that long!). We may also take a short afternoon break just to make sure everyone playing can see the other games and things going on (I don't want you to wander away in parts going "Oooh! Shiny!" ;-) ) Hope this sounds like fun to you guys, just remember, if you are making a warband for this game, please share some pics, either on a blog you are creating yourself, or on facebook Oldhammer's group, or on the forum. But if you do let me know, I'll try to draw attention to your cool stuff!
Also, thanks again to James! The inspiration is leading to cool things over here - and I hope you like how our version of this game sounds!
Thanks! -
The Restrictions of the Gods
When constructing your Army Roster, you must consider the following
decrees of the Dark Lords. These decrees exist purely for the Realm of
Chaos Mega Battle, if you wish to play additional RoC battles away from
the main table you need not follow these.
1) No daemonic weapons.
2) No daemonic entities (fielded, mounted or summoned), this is to be a
conflict of mortals, though undead auxiliaries are not forbidden.
3) Magic to be drawn from Battle, Illusion, Necromantic or Chaos God
specific spells, avoiding those that summon daemonic entities.
4) No magic items, banners or weapons. Cold steel, claws and other
normal weapons only. The only exception to this, are chaos weapons
granted to the Dark Lord's champions.
5) No technology. Technological weapons are banned from the battlefield.
This prohibition does not include weapons 'bonded' to the model as a
chaos attribute.
