More 7TV figures - evil cultists

My latest finished set of figures are these excellent Crooked Dice Cultists for 7TV. There are twelve figures in total.

First, here are the basic cult members, both male and female, some with firearms and others with clubs or knives. As well as being Initiates into the Dark Mysteries, they are also the muscle, used to keep prying investigators away from discovering exactly what goes on in that ruined abbey in the woods.

Now, here is the Magister of the Cult, together with his female counterpart and what appears to be a statue of the eldritch daemonic entity they worship, here shown in my Fenris Games Summoning Circle.

Next, here is the Magister and his Magistra again, together with the rest of the Cult's Inner Circle of Adepts and that Daemonic Entity again. The woman with the arcane book and the man with the chalice are Celebrants and the other woman is some kind of Seer or Prophetess, or maybe she is just struggling with mental health issues? Dabbling in the Dark Arts is fraught with all kinds of dangers.

Here are the senior Adepts worshipping Cthulhu. I mean, why stick to one terrible Dark Entity when there are so many available?

And here are the Celebrants invoking some Dark Powers, monoliths from Fenris Games.

I am really happy with these figures. I originally started painting a test figure with scarlet robes, but I wasn't happy with the results, so I went for this darker, more wine red shade, with purple for the Magister and Magistra. 

Hopefully, once lockdown and social distancing are a thing of the past, these will feature in a few games of 7TV.

My Saga: Age of Magic Otherworld warband is complete.

As mentioned in an earlier post, here I decided that most of my Warriors would be made from the North Star plastic Frostgrave Cultists box set. Well, I finally finished them off over the weekend just gone, and here they are;

As you can see, there are two groups of eight, all wearing a red/purple/lavender theme, with hooded faces. They are not all equipped the same, some have spears, others swords, axes and clubs. Some are carrying shields. Most of the shields are from the Cultist box, but there are also a couple of oblong shields from the Ghost Archipelago Snake Men set and also one or two small targets from the Perry plastic late mediaeval European Mercenaries box. I wanted these guys to have an almost uniform appearance but also have a degree of individuality, and I think that I have succeeded in this aim.

So, now they will have to make an appearance on the tabletop, and their first outing will be this coming Sunday at the club.

Two linked AARs for Alien Squad Leader

This post covers two games of ASQL at the club, fought between me and Richard. Originally, it was just one battle, but for reasons that will become apparent, we fought a second game a week later, using the same forces.

Here is some scene-setting narrative.

On the fringes of the regions of the galaxy occupied by Humans there lies a number of star systems inhabited by other, alien, civilisations, some of incredible age and others shrouded in secrecy and of an almost incomprehensible complexity. Of these civilisations, some shun all contact with Humanity but others have a long history of interaction, trade and conflict. One such civilisation is that of the Ry'Hlyn, a humanoid race of a quasi-arthropod nature and with an aggressive expansionist attitude. 

The Ry'Hlyn Empire is incredibly ancient and with links to Humanity that stretch back into the legendary shadowy prehistory of the long-lost and presumably destroyed Human home planet, Earth. The Elites of the Ry'Hlyn are devotees of a complex religion dedicated to ancient beings known in a number of legendary Human texts as the Outer Gods. No cult is more aggressive in its pursuit of all heresies than that of the trans-dimensional being known as Azathoth, once described thus in an ancient Human text; Outside the ordered universe is that amorphous blight of nethermost confusion which blasphemes and bubbles at the center of all infinity—the boundless daemon sultan Azathoth, whose name no lips dare speak aloud, and who gnaws hungrily in inconceivable, unlighted chambers beyond time and space amidst the muffled, maddening beating of vile drums and the thin monotonous whine of accursed flutes.

The first AAR describes a pursuit of a group of once-Human members of a Cult that worships a serpentine daemon god by a force of Azathoth Cult devotees (Alien Imperials in the ASQL rules) from the Ry'Hlyn Empire. The Serpent Cultists, commanded by Richard, have been pursued to a temporary stronghold on the banks of a river. Here, among the trees of the jungles that cover this world, a small force of Serpentines have made a stand, intending to repulse the enemy and prevent them from breaking through and destroying an important Cult Shrine.

The Serpentines have a number of  armoured vehicles and tanks of a fearsome appearance but questionable reliability.

These vehicles dominate the centre of the battlefield and guard the approaches to the road bridge on the Ry'Hlyn right flank.

 
The Ry'Hlyn advance in the centre, supported by heavy battle droids.

On the right, Ry'Hlyn heavy weapons move to occupy a small hill overlooking the road bridge.

On their left, Ry'Hlyn infantry advance behind a screen of fearsome Trained Beasts, led by troops from a Primitive subject race.

Before long, the Beasts, bred in terrible laboratories on blighted dark worlds by Ry'Hlyn sorceror-scientists using arcane techniques cross a foot bridge to the west of the main river crossing

Here, we can see the Ry'Hlyn centre and right flank, taking up a strong firing position.

Before long, the Beasts and their Primitive commanders destroy most of the Serpentine forces on the hills to the west of the main Serpentine position.

More Serpentine troops emerge from their armoured vehicles to try and prevent the Primitives from exiting the field of battle and therefore effecting a breakthrough.

Heavy fire ftom the advanced energy weapons of the Ry'Hlyn droids and heavy weapons cause much damage to the Serpentine vehicles, eventually causing one tank to explode in a ball of lacerating fire.

As the Beasts begin to exit the field, exultant Ry'Hlyn infantry advance across the river to engage the remaining Serpentines. 

However, it is too late for the Serpentines to prevent the Ry'Hlyn army from getting the required number of troops off the table and the battle is lost.

The victorious Ry'Hlyn commanders offer up prayers and invocations to mighty Azathoth and imbue their troops with Holy Zeal. They urge their troops onwards to destroy the obscene pollution that is the Serpent Shrine.

So, that was Battle One. Because it was so one-sided, Richard and I agreed to a rematch the following Sunday.

This second battle had the Serpentines defending a small settlement with an objective representing a sacred shrine to the Serpent deity.

 
Shielding the advance of the Ry'Hlyn alien army was a small forested area.

The Ry'Hlyn advanced with the Beasts once more on the left and the main body of troops in the centre.

A small group, including heavy weapons occupied a copse on the right.

 
Here is the objective, the Serpent Shrine.

Before long, Ry'Hlyn forces had occupied the forested areas. The plan was to use the Beasts to destroy the Serpentine right flank and roll them up, with the heavy weapons of the droids taking out the accursed tanks.

Before long, the Beasts were approaching combat.

Amazingly accurate shooting by the Serpentine Cultists caused damaging hits on the Ry'Hlyn droids. This was going to be a problem.

Even worse, the heavy weapons team on the right was soon destroyed. This pretty much eradicated the threat from here.

Although the Beasts had managed to kill or drive off many of the Serpentine defenders on the Ry'Hlyn left, they were unable to completely clear the area. This wasn't going according to plan.

To make things worse, hits were mounting on the heavy droids.

 The Beasts started to gain the upper hand, but was it just too little, too late?

The Ry'Hlyn heavy weapons in the centre were also destroyed, as was one of the heavy droids. Taking the objective was beginning to look like a lost cause.

The troops on the Ry'Hlyn right began to advance in the open to try and get close to the shrine.

Unhappily, this was unsuccessful as the Serpentines managed to destroy sufficient troop stands to force the Ry'Hlyn army to break.

So, the rematch, on ground sacred to the Serpetine Cult, proved to be a disaster for the Azathoth Cult of the Ry'Hlyn Empire. Assaulting troops in built-up areas proved to be a problem for the Beasts and early damage to the heavy droids reduced their effectiveness.

Nevertheless, the two games were hugely entertaining and I am looking forward to using my Alien Imperial Ry'Hlyn in the club's forthcoming ASQL tournament.

A Frostgrave AAR - my warband gets its first outing.

Last Sunday at the club my new Frostgrave warband got on the table against three other bands, those of Owen, Richard and Andy. Kev umpired the game. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, but luckily Owen took plenty of pictures, and he has kindly let me borrow them for this blog post.

This was a one-off game but I think that we are now planning a proper campaign, which will be good. So, here is the initial table;

People are already starting to deploy. I am coming in from the right of the picture. Here are some of my desperadoes moving through the ruins.

The game was notable at the start for the inability of the wizards to actually cast any spells, occasionally even causing themselves varying amounts of harm. At this point, I decided to save using magic until it was absolutely necessary.

Andy's band of Orcs made swift progress towards a huge pile of treasure but soon ran into problems and ended up embroiled in combat against a summoned demon that Richard brought on to the table as soon as he stopped failing to cast any spells.

His wizard seemed happier after that and late on in the game managed to cast Scatter Shot, which pretty much damaged everyone within range. He also managed to pick up an imp to fetch and carry coins.

Elsewhere, Owen advanced quite quickly, but became tangled up in a long-running combat with a ghoul. My wizard cast Bones of the Earth on one of his fighters, which anchored him while he was fighting the undead creature, allowing my guys to get past and head for more plunder.

Unhappily, a large and threatening White Worm attacked two of my thugs, killing one easily but the other fighter managed to hold on.

Owen's band seemed like an easier target than a giant grumpy vermiform, so I concentrated my attacks on them, sending an archer and a couple of fighters to pick off his gang.

At the same time, I sent a couple more of my men (including a zombie that my wizard raised from the grave) across the table to secure more loot. Owen's thief in the foreground wasn't really a threat.

Elsewhere, Andy was reeling from endless magical and earthly attacks, but managed to get his treasure away safely, even eventually seeing off the demonic entity that had caused him so many problems.

I also decided to cut my losses and make off with my plunder. Meanwhile Richard was plagued by a succession of attacks from marauding giant rats.

All in all, this was a terrific introduction to Frostgrave. The game mechanisms are pretty easy to grasp and the action comes fast and furious. I look forward to actually being able to gain experience and wealth in future games. 

In the meanwhile, I shall be painting up a few more magic users and maybe some other odds and ends for my Frostgrave collection.