There was once a sorcerer known as Zanzar Tem, a man of surpassing intelligence but also one with an unhealthy lust for power. His obsession led him to bargain with the Neverborn. For untold centuries he has performed the bidding of the great powers of chaos, providing great sport for the gods, until he came upon an artifact, a ring, which hid him from their sight. Tem has now raised up his own stronghold within the chaos wastes where he has begun a secretive work, fusing the industry of the forges and machines of the chaos dwarves and men with his own command of magic for his own nefarious purposes and not for the amusement of the gods of chaos, an affront they do not take lightly.

Now a call has gone out to the tribes of men steeped in the worship of the ruinous powers, they are drawn to the stronghold of Tem and seek only his destruction but first they must find their way through the wastes, drawing all manner of followers to their banners as the hone their prowess on the grindstone of the everchanging realm of chaos. Who will prove themselves a worthy champion of the gods? Who can bring ruin to Tem’s works for the laughter of the dark gods?

John S. wrote this as an introduction to a three-game narrative event he designed and ran a week ago. The event comprise of two regular campaign-style games, where warbands gained traits, artefacts and destiny levels, followed by an epic multi-player game set as Zanzar Tem was summoning the powers of the dark gods. The final game had several twists! Six players took part, which was an ideal number for the final game. Anyway, here are some photos of the games…

Game 1

I played Graham in Game 1. Both of us played well, with good positioning to claim objectives. I started with more models on the board and used that advantage to make the first kill. This put Graham at a bit of a disadvantage as his warband was a little model light with Mindstealer Sphiranx in the mix. His terrible dice luck was also a significant disadvantage. I managed to pull out a reasonably comfortable win. This led to some nice advances in my warband.

Game 2

My second game was against Brian and his lovely Flesh-Eater Courts warband. They were gorgeously painted and a lot of fun. Again, a relatively small model count for a warband. The mission was to wipe out the opponent’s Dagger. Brian mistook one of my models as being in the Dagger and focussed on getting it killed! This gave a bit of respite and I piled in on his Dagger, taking trophies and the win. Again, the game resulted in some lovely upgrades!

Multi-player Finale

This was a mad game, with gorgeous terrain, fully painted warbands and a nasty twist! In short we had to get as many models close to the ‘portal’ as possible. The downside was that as we got close the Lord of Change would bestow models with a ‘gift’! Another gift was the appearance of two monsters from the portal! The game was a bloody one, with leaders being targeted as killing them was the tiebreak in the scenario. Graham cannily kept his eye on the prize and didn’t get too embroiled in the carnage. The monster that moved towards him also jumped down from the walkway leading to the portal. This gave him a clear advance to the objective. Everyone else piled in, but not enough to stop his Cypher Lords from claiming the favour of the dark god!

All told, it was a really fun narrative event. Big thanks to John as the instigator, architect and games master. Thank you!

Until next time,

Owen