Mordheim: The Enemy Within campaign - the final 2 Objectives

Here I'm releasing the last 2 objectives for the Enemy Within campaign: The Raiders (rampaging tribes and marauders pillaging from town to town) and The Seekers (treasure hunters and entrepreneurs, with also a smuggling alternative).

Finally, after much delay, I can release the last 2 objectives for the campaign.
Plots- The Raiders, The Seekers, The Smugglers (click here to download)

'The Raiders' objective is for those warbands who want to make a career out of raiding & pillaging settlements and caravans, while they amass an small army to carve out a small kingdom.
This objective is designed to be one of the simpler ones to follow, to help beginners or those of us who would rather have a more straightforward approach to Mordheiming :)
This is also one of the few objectives in this campaign that allows the max warband size to be exceeded several times (up to +4 warriors). 
One of the elements that interacts well with the Exploration table is that building new encampments, or upgrading existing encampments, adds Campaign Points ( representing the Raiders' staking out new hideouts and staying on the move).
The objective is completed only after fighting a large field battle on the tabletop, approaching the size of small detachments (with special rules to accompany it). If you ever wanted to finish a campaign with your Mordheim Leader at the head of a small Warhammer army, this is the chance.

'The Seekers' is the reason why this release was so delayed. It's probably the more complex objective, and is an adaptation of 'The Lure of Treasure' objective from Border Town Burning.
Instead of collecting Cathayan silks as a way to reach victory, the warband must choose one of a number of specialty lists, containing related items. They have to somehow acquire AND SELL these items in order to gain Campaign Points.
Furthermore, the objective allows a Hero to miss a battle, and take a vehicle to travel to their Homeland's supplier, where they can buy items off from their starting equipment table (at the costs listed and without rolling for Rarity). Essentially, this allows Dwarven and Elven merchants to ship their wares from home and sell them off for profit in the Empire.
The objective also allows for maintaining more than one encampment, as the warband establishes a franchise: in the form of shopfronts, taverns and trading posts, which grant more Campaign Points.

As an alternative to 'The Seekers' objective, players can instead choose 'The Smugglers' variant, which has a specialty list composed exclusively of illegal items. It follows a similar development as 'The Seekers' with the exception that Heroes can gain the Disguise skill (which allows undesirables to enter law-abiding Locations), and their final objective is to make a run out of the Empire to the New World.

Both of these objectives, like 'The Sellswords' before, involve a lot of use of the new Encampments rules. Prepare to see a lot more raiding of encampments (and having to build adequate defences) in 'The Enemy Within', especially since an evicted warband risks losing not only their hideout but also some Campaign Points!!


Items required to finish 'The Enemy Within':

• Random Events - (draft exist in scribbly form)
• Hired Swords - (scribbly drafts have been spoiled on the blog before!)
• Organizations - (I also have scribbly drafts)
• Scenario rules - (rewrite of originals), more than half is playtested

I wish to start a more systematic playtesting of scenarios at our local shop, to iron some final kinks.
But if some of you have tested any of the rules in your home games, please don't hesitate to share your feedback! We can build a better game the more issues we detect beforehand.

Roll high and prosper!

Castle Wittgenstein: a multiplayer scenario for 'The Enemy Within' Mordheim Campaign

And we are back to releases for "The Enemy Within" Mordheim campaign! Phew, this one took time to bake!

Hang in there, I have more coming!

Finally I've managed to finish this campaign's multiplayer set-piece battle.

'Castle Wittgenstein' pits a couple of warbands defending the castle, hired by a corrupt baroness dabbling in dark magic, from everyone else. The other warbands will be trying to either bring the baroness to justice, steal her warpstone, or just take over the castle. Whether they work together or compete from the first round onwards is up to them.

'The Enemy Within' - Castle Wittgenstein (scenario)

Castle Wittgenstein is the iconic location where the plot of 'Death on the Reik', the 3rd chapter of ' The Enemy Within' classic WFRP campaign, finally resolves and where the heroes track down the source of chaos corruption affecting the region.

Our "first-generation, not-fully-compliant-with-rules" terrain for this scenario.

In this Mordheim campaign, the lawful warbands represent the well-intentioned heroes, while any chaos warbands (or other unscrupulous/criminal types) will be defending the baroness. Of course, warbands following the 'Host of Horrors' objective (invariably Skaven) will be trying to steal the warpstone meteorite that the baroness owns, by invading the castle from the underground.

Assaulting the castle is no small feat: this is no ruined keep with holes in its walls, although one can claim that not all expenses were spared when it comes to hiring the best soldiers to defend it. The defending warbands will be outnumbered, and will have to fend off an assault coming from the outer walls, as well as preventing enemies coming in from the underground tunnels and underground dock.

On the other hand, there are several attacking warbands, each with their own objective. While they may initially cooperate to invade the castle and defeat the defenders, they will be at odds with each other as their end goals will be in direct conflict.

This will be one of the most daring siege scenarios for Mordheim: 2 sets of walls (an Outer and Inner Bailey) 2 bridges and 3 gates to punch through. This of course only fully applies to the Lawful warbands, who start the battle outside the walls of the Outer Bailey. At least part of the Rivals warband may deploy on boats and rafts adjacent to the castle's underground dock. This allows that warband to also infiltrate the underground tunnels that lead to the Inner Bailey, bypassing the gates and bridges.

It is a complex setup, and I might have to tweak it as I playtest it further.

However, the distribution of attacking warbands (some outside the walls and others infiltrating) and the fact they outnumber the defenders 2:1, serves as a balancing factor. Furthermore, defenders don't immediately rout as normal: they instead fall back to the next defensible position (from the Outer Bailey to the Bridge Tower, then to the Inner Bailey, then the Manor).

Playing 'Castle Wittgenstein' will also require some extra props beyond the castle scenery: you need some underground tiles, and a large building with at least 10 rooms ( not counting corridors).

To ensure those with a more conservative terrain collection can play the scenario, the campaign supplement will include a set of underground tiles, as well as house interior tiles. This way you can set up the Manor as simply a large building (with no actual rooms inside) and then use the tiles as warbands move inside it.

The scenario requires a good bit of preparation, as it's got several special rules. But after all, it is meant as a landmark in the campaign, with as many warbands as possible participating.

If one of the players acts as the game organizer, keeping up with the rules will be much easier, as there will be at least one person who will have the big picture in mind, and can remind other players.

Note that there is room for a lot of shady deals and unexpected role-switching when assigning roles in this scenario. Unscrupulous Sellswords in service of an Elector can momentarily join forces with the Wittgensteins for this battle if it fits their purpose. And a band of Chaos Cultists could have a fierce hatred of the Beastmen the Wittgensteins have allied with, and will thus try to storm the castle as well.

Hope you enjoy, and I appreciate any feedback you can throw my way (which it will probably need!).

Roll high and prosper.

'The Undertown' scenario playtesting and Campaign Rules (The Enemy Within)

Here I release another new scenario for "The Enemy Within", and discuss some of the issues in playing and optimizing scenarios with random tile placement. I also release the Campaign special rules for "The Enemy Within", including warriors under arrest and Convictions, capturing hostages, succumbing to the lure of Chaos, and what kind of loot you can find inside Imperial Cargo.



While I was still re-writing the 'Castle Wittgenstein' scenario (as promised), we had a reunion with our friends from our Edinburgh Gaming Group, staying at a lakeside cabin in Minnesota. Fishing, marshmellows by the campfire and of course, wargaming.
We hadn't played together in more than a year, so we couldn't let the opportunity pass.



'The Undertown' scenario (click to download):
This scenario is very much based on Werekin's 'Burrow Town Collapsing' scenario from 'Mutiny in Marienburg', and follow most of the guidelines and standards he set there.
I also drew from some of the original work done on Mordheim sewer scenarios, by Christian Elegaard in Town Cryer, adding rules for navigating slippery sludge and rickety sewer planks, which I felt were missing, as well as an added fear effect that can get models running in the dark.

The Undertown pits the warbands stalking each other while they navigate the sewers and catacombs under the cities of the Empire.

New stuff in this underground scenario:
The Undertown focuses mostly in the defending warband (the one who picked the scenario) trying to find a special Hidden Room, which will be different depending on what type of warband it is and what they are trying to achieve. This can be a warpstone deposit, an illegal congregation to Chaos, a Traitor contact with secret info and contraband, or even the keep's dungeon to spring their comrades out of solitary confinement. The last tile will always be this Hidden Room, if someone hasn't found it yet.

Along the way, they can find random rooms with some loot, like a well to the surface, a crypt, or an abandoned cellar. Bodysnatcher warbands can have their fill raiding those crypts in search of fresh corpses and heirlooms.

For attacking warbands, there is also something to be gained other than just pursuing the defending warband: arresting the Traitor or burning down the Chaos shrine earns Campaign Points to warbands following particular Objectives. They can also stumble upon other special rooms by chance, just by Exploring new tiles.

As in 'Burrow Town Collapsing', there are random Subterranean Events, which include the deadly infamous traps and wandering monsters and denizens of the tunnels. Both of these were the target of a bit of tweaking, for reasons that will be explained below.

Re-balancing in random-tile scenarios:
There were a number of things we felt needed addressing. We have played 'Burrow Town Collapsing' quite a few times now, mostly without too many problems. However, there were a few things we felt needed addressing.

Random tile generation mostly works well, but its not uncommon that a warband finds themselves surrounded by dead-ends at some point. Of course, there is the "Heroes search for the secret door" mechanic, which solves this problem, but in the case of some warbands (especially low-Initiative warbands) this can take 1-3 rounds. And often this occurs near the beginning of the game, so some warbands remain isolated from everyone else for a large part of the battle.
For the sake of "The Rule of Fun", we felt that we needed to reduce the chance of this happening, so I reorganized the 'Unexplored Tiles' table to increase the probability of generating T-junctions instead of more turns and corridors. More access to the table is always good, players get to move around better, and the game moves along faster.

I also added an Aqueduct tile (represented as a narrow bridge across the tile), which has the same rules as the Aqueduct event in Burrow Town Collapsing (if you fall on the water you are washed into another random tile).




Subterranean Events I find are very interesting, but two things stood out as being a bit too distracting from the game. These are Traps and the Rats & Spiders. Oh my sweet gods, the rats.
Let's go by parts.

The Traps in these underground scenarios come from the Khemri ruleset, and I love their originality. However, it is clear that some traps are far, FAR deadlier than others. Particularly the Sandbox trap. But their order on the table makes some of the deadlier traps have a higher probability to appear than others, which doesn't make much sense. Sandbox can kill an entire warband in one go, through no fault of the player. I know this is Mordheim and it is supposed to be deadly, but I felt some re-ordering of the table was needed.
Another trap-like event, which was a very big offender, was the Mold (the sleep-inducing fungus). This is the one that Stuns models if they fail a Toughness test. Is an interesting trap, but it happened far too often and delayed the game far too much. I placed it in the table as the lowest probability event to occur.

Now for the animals. The rats were just everywhere, all the time. So many Giant Rats. Warbands spent more time fighting them instead of each other. We first reduced the  number that appear, then I decided to move them to the Tunnel Dwellers Subterranean Event result. I kept a "swarm of rats" event result, which just deals damage but then goes away, to still feature rats often (its the sewer after all), but it keeps things moving much better.
And the spiders, oh the spiders. Warriors getting caught in webs everywhere, dwarves and zombies failing their Initiative tests to escape, and us watching our gaming time being occupied with meaningless combats. It happened too often in the Events. I removed the Spiders altogether, and kept them for a more cave-based scenario.


To finish, I padded out the Subterranean Events table results with slippery floors and rotten planks, which add a bit more variety but don't delay the game as much, and present the players with an interesting challenge yet one that is easier to plan around. I also introduced the 'Spooked!' result, which scares D6 warriors (dripping water, noise in the corner, feeling something crawl up their leg, etc) who have to test for Fear or run away screaming. Of course, Skaven, Dwarves and Night Goblins get a bonus as they are used to these tunnel conditions.
This helps make a trip  underground in the dark a scarier prospect, and make those Ld scores on every model count!

Tunnel Dwellers: I changed the table for random monsters in this scenario, to make sure that cultists and mutants show up (it wouldn't be The Enemy Within if they didn't!). There is also a chance that Sewer Jacks show up, who will team up with Lawful warbands and fight against smugglers and evil warbands, so it's not all bad news.

Campaign Special Rules (click to Download):
Here are the special rules that apply when running The Enemy Within campaigns. These may evolve a bit more still, as I start now to connect all the working parts of the ruleset to ensure they all run smoothly.

Putting warriors under arrest works like in Mutiny in Marienburg, but the Conviction chart roll is modified by having worse results if the model is a Chaos worshipper, a Criminal or carrying drugs or illegal items.

This campaign requires that players assign Alignments to warbands, which will determine what roles they play in many scenarios. Lawful warbands will always be the ones protecting civilians, while Evil warbands will always be the ones attacking them, and so forth. Nonetheless, there are Objectives that allow many warbands to remain Neutral in alignment, and still have some flexibility in their roles.

There are also expanded rules for taking hostages during battles, and what options are available to each warband if they acquired captives during battle or Exploration. Because this campaign makes use of structures built within encampments, using captives as slave labour (Prisoners of War) can speed up construction and free up henchmen to join the battles.

Trade rules are the same as laid out in Mutiny in Marienburg, but more scenarios in this campaign make use of Information Points. These allow the warband that earns them during a game turn to be able to choose their next scenario, gain Campaign Points or unlock special scenarios.

The rulesheet also reprints the 'Eye of the Gods' and 'Marks of the Dark Gods' rules, which allow any Chaos warband to have access to Marks of Chaos, and earn mutations when they advance.
New to this campaign setting is Heretic Converts: whenever your warband has too many models with mutations, carrying magical wyrdstone shards or illegal spellbooks, you may have to start rolling to see if Chaos seduces them. If they do, they will stage a coup within the warband, and install a new leader that can promote the glory of Chaos (and possibly forcing the warband to change Objective).

The Fantasy Flight Games center outside Minneapolis.
What a humongous gaming space. With a full bar as well!

This is all for now, folks. 
I hope to get the Castle Wittgenstein scenario up sooner than this (its been quite a while since my last post!).

Until then, roll high and prosper!

Mordheim demo @ Devir Arena, Lisbon, Portugal

This time, I decided to bring some Mordheim to my own country. Plant the seed, to get people interested.
So I went for 2 weeks holidays back home, and called up the bigger local gaming store to see if they had place for us to play.

And boy, was I surprised: the place had SO much space and gaming tables, full of beautifully painted terrain. I was used to it in the gaming shops of the UK, but none of this really existed in Portugal while I was growing up. It was very niche (even amongst gamers).
Portuguese gamers, rejoice, and head to your local store for games! 😃 They got the space!

I ran a simplified version of Mordheim, where each player only controlled a Hero and two henchmen, all pre-generated with weapons and equipment.
Very fast-paced and simple to use, and thankfully I had many models available for players to pick among several types of warband.
It's all in the preparation, people!

We played a simple King-of-the-Hill scenario, with the players trying to take control of the portal in the center of the table.
We had a Dwarf Treasure Hunters warband, a Wood Elves warband, and a Cult of the Possessed warband playing.

It was a small affair (mostly because it was announced on such short notice!) but it gave me an idea of how much tabletop strategy and skirmish gaming is starting to take hold back home.
It is really growing.
This speaks a lot to a Games Master's ability to round up gaming groups of interested players, as it does require some groundwork and a network of gamer friends. You need to be patient and work on it, playing and talking with people and raising awareness for a year or so, before one can start launching new initiatives. And advertising is important! (see end of post)
This worked well in the Edinburgh gaming scene (having spent 3 years as a RPG GM and 2 years as a Mordheim organizer). But then again, the UK is more of a fertile ground for gamers (many have been playing for decades), and many gaming venues already existed, or opened in the last years.

 Age of Sigmar is apparently attracting new players in Portugal, if only because of their discounted starter boxes and ability to start playing with few models.
Which is exactly what GW *DID NOT* do for the longest time, where they could have supported low-model gaming modes, such as Mordheim, Warhammer Skirmish and warbands.

Now Age of Sigmar is really exploring all those ideas, and literally asking players to set up their own campaigns and house rules. I have to tip my hat off to the gentlemen (and madams) in charge of this shift in company policy. :)
See here and here what they have been fostering in the Community.

This is a great step forward in bringing the narrative side of the game to major events full of enthusiastic players. And a recognition for the role of Campaign Masters and organizers in tabletop strategy games, beyond the tournament setting.

We would like to thank Carlos Almeida, from Especulatorio magazine, for coming and trying out some Mordheim with us.

Especulatorio is a monthly portuguese e-magazine, which covers all major news, talks, local events and development within the geek gaming, movie and literature industry.
The group also organizes community gaming events, and fosters debate about gaming trends and the future of geek interests.

Mordheim advert - stick it on the wall of your gaming store!

Just replace the "Warhammer Narratives" logo on the bottom with your own gaming group's logo and rules link, and you are good to go!

Roll high and prosper!

Death on the Reik - Scenario playtesting (The Enemy Within campaign)

This post discusses our playtest of the "Death on the Reik" scenario, and of our current revised rules for boats in Mordheim.

The second in a series of scenario playtests, 'Death on the Reik' takes its name from one of the modules of the original Enemy Within campaign for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. Like the module, it introduces all the lovely river life of the empire to the players, and is a great way to explore the rules for boats without actually having to buy any with your hard-earned gold crowns.

The updated version of the scenario can be found here:

Death on the Reik (click to download)

'Ahoy Riverdogs!'

To this end and to ensure everything went smoothly, I have compiled a revised set of boat rules for Mordheim. This puts together the original rules from Empire in Flames and the revisions in the Sartosa supplement, with Warhammer Ahoy! rules (by Tim Eagling) to augment the range of actions the models can take, and ensure most common situations are covered (like boarding actions!).

The ruleset was expanded from the original boat rules, for adaptation to the "Mutiny in Marienburg" Mordheim campaign. Werekin (from Liber Malefic) laid out the framework and direction for all this, and DicLombardi (from TBMF) helped steer the rules development in the right direction.
Ahoy Riverdogs (revised Mordheim boat rules) (click to download)

Please note these rules are still a work in development. Much has been done before in other rulesets regarding boats in Mordheim by other members of the community. This is no attempt to infringe on their creations, quite the contrary: I would like to pool their knowledge and tested rules to hopefully craft a better, more smooth ruleset for boats in the game.

This scenario involves a defending warband having to protect a boat's contents from raiders. 

The scenario is actually several scenarios in one: the 'River Life of the Empire' table will randomly decide what is on the barge and the corresponding objectives and special rules. The defenders may have to protect Cargo crates, a Merchant, a Priest or even a group of annoying nobles having a boat party. Alternatively, the defenders may get stuck actually defending smugglers, and might have to make the decision to take them to the authorities instead (and perhaps skimming some of their goods). Take a look at the table: there is a lot of narrative potential there, and each option will result in a very different battle unfolding.

Something we noted right when we were setting terrain was that the width and shape of the river will affect the battle a lot. Make sure to follow the guidelines to place a few bottlenecks to reduce the width to the right amount: otherwise attackers will have to swim very far to even have a chance to reach the barge. Yes, models can swim across the deep water, but they better not risk a trip while wearing heavy armour!

Players should remember that 2" from the shores is still shallow water, so models can still stand and move slowly across it, helping to close the distance to the boat if they wish to swim. It also means that boats should avoid the shallows, else they may risk running aground.

An Elven kinband from Laurelorn forest guards a
merchant boat headed up the Reik.

We found this scenario to be a good introduction to the boat rules, as no warband needs to own any boats in advance (but if they do they can field a small flotilla!). 

The scenario gives the defender the control of a barge with sails, so it introduces all the basic rules for boats plus the rules for sails. The attacker gets a raft and a rowboat, so the boat rules are even simpler for them.

Cultists of Chaos lie in wait for the boat to approach.

Still, these cover many important interactions, such as when boats are allowed to move, or how can characters climb on board or hold on to moving boats, and of course boarding actions. 

Several new rules for boats took shape from the 'Warhammer Ahoy!' ruleset. This includes the sails, oars and running aground rules.

Beastmen and Cultists advance aboard their raft.

The Mutants and Cultists on the rowboat reveals themselves
from out of a canal tunnel.

We realized quickly that setting a boat on fire is one of the best ways to force its crew to be distracted, as they must put it out quickly or risk it destroying the boat. The rules to set boats alight and the ones for the crew to put the fire out looked quite balanced, so while it will always be worth it to try and burn an enemy boat down, it by no means spells doom for the boat if it is properly crewed.

The Cultists strike with thrown torches, which quickly set the
boat on fire... making the elves on board scramble to put it out.

An important support role was filled by the fraction of the defending warband that deployed in one of the river shores, especially if they are armed with missile weapons. They can put pressure on the attackers on land too, and have better maneuverability to aim and shoot than their mates on the barge.

For attackers, having more boats is definitely a better approach. In our game some of the attackers had to swim to get to the barge, something that takes ages and can be quite dangerous. But if the barge is adrift (if the captain is kept distracted with, say, a knife to the throat) then swimming aboard becomes much easier.

Kithband warriors escort the merchant boat from the shore,
taking aim at attacking Cultists on the raft.

Boarding action!

It turned out that stealing cargo away from the barge was quite difficult: once aboard, attackers tend to be quite busy fighting the defenders to grab Cargo, unless they have overwhelming numbers . It is much more straightforward to try to commandeer the barge. Nonetheless, we kept the rules as they were, because just in case someone manages to steal some of the Cargo, at least they may get some benefit from it.

A swift boarding by the Cultists makes short work of the
elven bodyguards.

A Possessed swims across to climb aboard the boat and wreck havoc,
while a many-armed mutant sets his sights on the boat captain.

The last elven defenders aboard the boat are cornered by
drunken Cultists and Beastmen.

This scenario has its own small table of Random Happennings, thematically suited to the river location (and also to make the scenario less complicated by avoiding the usual Random Happenings). In our case this involved the defender being flanked by a troupe of forest goblins. But it couldve very easily have been the attacker's warband. Other encounters involve river pirates or riverwardens (on a rowboat), a bog octopus or even rocky shallows!

The captain holds valiantly to the wheel of his ship, but is at the
mercy of a Mutant. The boat soon belongs to the Cultists of Chaos.

And here it is, finally some update on Enemy Within.
Rules development has been moving here in the background, but I still am changing lots of the text and putting things together in nice PDFs. 
Don't believe it? Here is my commuting-notebook for evidence! :)

Many things are drafted, but unfinished. But it is all moving at a steady pace.

TEASER: next time
Recently our group playtested the "Castle Wittgenstein" multiplayer-fest scenario. I still have to make changes to all the rules that raised issues, but it served quite well as a big slufest with multiple objectives and different battlefield areas to control. Suitably Epic, and should work as a good mid/late-campaign get-together. I shall put up the scenario rules soon.

Until then, roll high and prosper!