BTB: Rat Race

It was in the dew of the morning that the slayers woke up hearing the skitter of little paws. Was it little paws ... or just paws running around they wondered. Bjorgir was a bit on edge because there was little to eat the last couple of days. In the blasted region of the city they were in now, nothing but derelict houses and a faint drizzle all day. You could get quite glum about this, especially with an empty belly. The skittering noises made him think of rats...rat-on-a-stick! A smile grew on the face of Bjorgir and poking his fellow warband members awake a plan formed in his head.

The Magister looked at the runes and smiled. Some days ago he had successfully summoned a lesser demon out of the warp to extend his warband. In exchange for this blessing of the Plaguefather a shibboleth had to be executed. And now the target was near...



The two slayers were very eager to get some rats and were out in no time. But they were not the only ones out there! Just around the corner some Possessed were slithering around with their mutated bodies also looking for food. Also hoof noises could be heard now so some beasties were about also. The beardlings were muttering amongst themselves that the undead wouldn't be far away either. Sarr said: "A perfect morning for a massive fight around some scrawny little rats". Dru and Crumble agreed and were getting ready to face a heavy day.



Locating the dwarf had not been very hard; obviously they were hunting for rats and not very secretive about their whereabouts. However, those pesky rats were hard to ignore, two of them were even attacking. On top of that a loose chaos hound had appeared and attacked Frogface, who (off course) was not up to the task of fighting a meager hound.

But now father Nurgle was really smiling at them! Their price was approching fast (for at dwarf that is)! The aberration, the false blackblood, the requested sacrifice was actually charging them!!

Then everything happened very fast. A rat darted by and the two slayers were loose! Charging into the rat and hacking it to pieces. The rest of the warband were huddling around the corner to check for more. There were more rats running around, a lot more rats you could say. They were so fast it was difficult to tell how big they really were. In the meantime, the rats as the beastmen, undead and possessed were running around and chasing rats.



One particular big rat was boring down on the necromancer of the undead pack! This was a rat of abominable size. The beastmen were charging into the graveyard for some rats with their rabid dogs leading the pack. One of the dogs strayed a bit and ran around one of the pillars of a ruined temple to find a big hammer of the possessed warband leader in its way. With a big squelching sound the dog found its end right there: Not only the rats were meeting their fate.



Nurgly the Magister had by now killed a rat and finished off the stunned chaos hound. Flyface was literally sniffing out the carcass of the abominable rat. He found a wyrdstone shard, yet another sign that the true Chaos God was smiling at them.

But not all was going well. The false blackblood dwarf was a formidable fighter and had more and more dwarfs were joining the fray. And it were the followers of Chaos that were suffering. Several henchies were taken out of action or laying knocked down and both the Possessed were down to their last wound.



Half of the rat pack were now getting nervous with so much mayhem around them and were sprinting of the table. Another two rats were caught in a fight, but the rest escaped. The necromancer was having some big trouble with the big rat facing him.
Meanwhile Loki the bigger slayer flattened the rat with one mighty sweep of his axe. Looking around in a battle craze he saw some movement around the corner and blindly charged into it. The possessed over there were caught by surprise and were getting slaughtered. This was one mean slayer! Everywhere the possessed hit the slayer the blood spraying around was even inflicting wounds. Some of the possessed had that same skill and in moments 5 possessed were surrounding the slayer and damage was dealt very hard. Luckily the rest of the dwarf warband was around to try to help out Loki. It could be questioned if this was, what a slayer would really want, especially since Loki was truly in his element. Some disgruntled shouts from Loki to Bjorgir were also getting the concentration away and the battle swung towards the possessed. Loki was paying too much attention to his fellow warband members not to take out HIS enemies, letting him die his much wanted heroic death, that the possessed landed some blows. Still the tough slayer did not go down, and it was becoming very close. Some of the possessed were chopped away only to be replaced by new foul plaguebearers and whatnot. Loki was doing his best but his mind was not completely to it. The possessed were actually looking to flee of the field or this entire battle to end. Their wishes were not being granted by a necromancer, who was still fighting that giant rat.



The Magister resisted the urge to flee; this task had to be completed or else... He felt chaos powers pour away as a Plabuebearer was sent back to the Chaos courts by the black blooded Slayer. The Magister grawled and rushed in himself, with him the rest of his minions too attacked the dwarfs.

Then it was too much for the big orange crested fellow, too much blows at once, not able to parry them all, Loki went down. The rest of warband wanting revenge, swung in this melee but the possessed although wrung through a grinder, were getting new vigor by slaying the slayer and were really bearing down on the dwarfs. It was soon that the dwarfs saw they were no match and ran of the battlefield with only one rat to share.

A green light lit up the ruins around the small square were some hours ago the dwarfs and possessed had met. Now the mutilated corpse of a slayer was surrounded by the strange shapes of his opponents. A dark liquid, much much darker than normal dwarven blood, was leaking on the ground. Floating above the body was a strange shining bulb, that grew into a crack, a passage toward the courts of chaos. For a moment a bellowing laughter could be heard accompanying a Plaguebearer striding through.

"Father Nurgle is very pleased with your deeds, master magister" Hissed the Plaguebearer. "He sends you this" The minor demon continued and handed over a putrefied, rusted axe. The Magister looked at the warped piece of metal and smiled, recognizing the axe as the one the slayer had barried in the killed Plaguebearer.

We player the Rat Race scenario found on the Wargame Weaver site. A very nice multi player scenario which really fits the Border Town Burning settings and is good fun to play (Thanx Jim!). Minor nitpicks/recommendations: Use random movement (or the Border Town Burning monster rules) instead of the 12" movement for the rats.

new slayer here

A small update on the painting front. I've been mostly busy with digging in the garden the last couple of weeks. I'm also growing a small beard and not that big so I get more and more comments of me becoming closer to dwarfmanship! In so far I'm not digging with a pick axe so I think I'm far from it, but denial is one of the first stages maybe?
Anyway, in the sparse time in between there have been moments I could pick up my paint brush and there was this slayer mini from avatars of war that screamed for being painted.
There is also a great tutorial on bugmans on how to paint a dwarf slayer with this model as an example. I studied the howto and got to work.

A good slayer with agressive looking eyes but he still ahd to maintain a sort of comic look about him what I like in mini's they shouldn/t become to serious in my opinion. I think that is why gobbo's as well as dwarfs appeal to me opposed to the empire or elves.

Aside I'm also working on a good looking thunderer for my dwarf treasurehunter warband. He's getting a leather armour apron garment thingie and coming along nicely:



And you always have to look out for loose laying TNT packages while painting:

Small overview of a part of the painting area with some other works in progress.

Outside gaming

Our last game of Mordheim with the six of us we've played outside. The temperature didn't drop below 25 at night zo ideal situation to put the tables out and play. No problems with cramped gaming tables and whatnot and enjoying the weather as well! Some around neighbours were indeed checking out, what was going on with the bunch of guys debating around tables with scenery, measuring and moving miniatures and debating loudly over it, calling for the rulebook more often then not!

Our BTB campaign was played outside this time. For the "Horrors of the Underground" the table wasn't big enough so they played on the ground. I believ the Possessed went in the underground with every intention of finding some chaos stuff. Behind them a starting marauders warband stepped in the dungeon, found an egg and ran out again. Al done in mere minutes! It took more time to set up everything then to play the scenario here.

The lost caravan scenario's is already heavily discussed on this blog and a game of a starting Dwarf (another!) warband agains some undead was played. Quite gruesome ending for the undead I believe (although they were dead to begin with!).

BTB: The lost caravans

The late evening sun shines red on the few buildings in fore town of the borderland city Mohawa. The occasional grunt and murmur sound was heard from one of the buildings. Inside a group of dwarves known as the Alequaffers was tending their wounds.
Bjorgir was discussing with Grach that it was for the best that Grach would go to the mountains to report the latest findings and doings of the warband. Not speaking of the fact it would better to get better from the horrible wound he just suffered.
Meanwhile Durri and Loki were the no happy dwarves and quaffing some stale ale. They survived a battle where they faced enormous odds. Loki even got stuck in battle with 6 beastmen before he went down. He dealt some terrible carnage and was becoming a massive dwarf all together.
“It is a terrible loss” Grom muttered. “The beardlings go for fame and adventure, not for cold nights, little food and death.” One of the beardlings wasn’t with them anymore. That last fight was too much for him. One of the Ogre villains thumped him quite badly and the beastmen trampling over him afterwards were too much.

What happened with the warband today? In this small fore town, on the middle of the road they found a wagon being trashed by ogres. 5 Ogres in total were bashing into 5 guards the Merchant had hired.

The Merchant’s wagon was already smashed to bits, the horses run away and the crew was barely standing. In the middle of this fight the dwarfs saw a fellow merchant in trouble and dashed towards the fighting spree to help. At the same time at the other end of the road a massive group of beastmen saw the riches of the Merchant’s caravan and was not planning to leave that to the ogres.


Dwarves and Beastmen charged the Ogres who proved to be very sturdy indeed. Loki and Durri were hacking and slashing into one Ogre while one the 3 beardlings were watching from a distance. They were too afraid to come even near the battle.
From a distance Grach and two thunderers were shooting away with their handguns. Clouds of smoke were billowing everywhere with every volley they shot. Grach being the expert he made a big difference in how fast he could reload and shoot. “Keep practicing lads” he shouted with a mad grin as he shot another round of lead towards the ogres.

The clouds of smoke probably obscured their vision somewhat, because after rounds of lead no ogre suffered any wounds from the handgunners! Their aim was a bit off this fight.

Eventually the beastmen managed to get 3 ogres down and the slayers also hacked one to the ground. The remaining guards took care of the last ogre and now the dwarfs were standing opposing the beastmen. With some hesitation the beastmen charged the dwarfs. Now the real fighting was commencing. First rounds the dwarfs took heavy casualties.

When Durri went down, Loki was infuriated and started chomping away. He felled 4 beastmen himself. The beardlings were going down very fast and now the thunderers were being attacked. They were no match in hand to hand fighting. Grach was swinging his hammer for all he was worth but it was to no avail. All dwarfs went down in this massacre.


Hours after the battle Bjorgir was gathering his warband, he feared the worst. “How many would have survived the onslaught?” he thought. His head still ringing from the blows he received, the noble found out there quite some survivors. Actually he brightened up seeing his entire warband there…no wait…one of the beardlings was not present. This still was a dark day for the Alequaffers. Some new grudges would be written down and remembered the next fights they entered.

All along the watchtower

Finally (and just in time for todays battle) the watchtower is completed!


Built in 'nerd bricks'it is assembled out of blocks cast out of Hirst Arts molds. Most blocks are from molds 50 and 61, with the floors coming out of mold 281. Additional add ons are stair parts of mold 60 (Thanks Tom!) and several items of mold 282.

The watchtower consists of three separte parts, to accommodate entering and moving inside the tower (at ground level) and transport.

More pictures (courtesy of Anke Bot fotografie ;-) can be found here.

Showcasing some new finished dwarfs

Just a quick update on some finished dwarfs. I've been quite busy painting different dwarfs that will serve as backup for the ever expanding Dwarf treasurehunter warband I'm playing for our Border Town Burning campaign. The further idea is to keep on painting the dwarfs in order to build up a small army for Warhammer Fantasy Battle. Especially now the 8th edition is coming out. In the meantime I'm reading and learning the new rules I am painting them dwarfs and hopefully I can field a nice Dwarf army in due time.
First up here a dwarf ironbreaker. I got this box quite cheap and this is the first one painted. They paint pretty quick since it is a lot of metal they carry! :)

Next up dwarf slayer you have already seen on this blog but I got this nice skeleton sign that is really Mordheimy and I had to paint it. It has a little base of his own so can be put anywhere in our city of Mordheim.

I don't know if I put the finished engineer with the brace of pistols already here, but it's a nice picture of him so he may join this blog post for now.

Finally a new beardling I painted. As on of the other beardlings he has the "Bugmans" shield and the green clothing. In total there are three of them and I think they fit in together quite nicely now. These old mini's also have some sort of comic look I like, big noce, nice stature and it's a dwarf with a sword you don't see often.

BTB: Traces to Emprise

“Get up, you lazy bastards!”. Bjorgir Borgurson was shouting at two slayers and prodding at two slayers in the corner of a derelict building. This was the place where they ended their feasting of the night before. Especially the slayers were doing honor to the warbands name: AleQuaffers.
With a lot of grunting and a splitting headache Durri IronBounder and his fellow slayer Loki Borsson got up. Dwarf axes still in hand but wobbling a bit unsteady after that barrel of Bugmans they found here and emptied completely, the slayers were sort of ready to go. In the corner of the building Sarr Veinsmasher and Crumble Dobnose were staring in awe at the two battle-hardened slayers. The two beardlings just joined the warband for fame and fortune (or rather … loads of gold!!!!). They were staring with big eyes to the large orange crests that were now a bit ruffled after a night’s boozing.

Bjorgir was getting his warband out and about and was having difficulty with it. That barrel of Bugman’s really hit home in the warband, but was a welcome reward after days of rummaging around these blighted borderlands. They found this sort of derelict outpost of a city and finally had some stone buildings around them for the night. These nights in the open sky were not good for a dwarf was Bjorgir’s opinion. Of noble born Bjorgir was used to the big halls and rooms in Karak Bardag, the hold of Dwarf king Dordom. As a lad Bjorgir was always curious to what was outside the hold. Books telling of fame and fortune (and the gold of his ancestors) led him to gather a warband around him to start looking for this fame and fortune.
He started heading out of the hold with his longtime friend Grach SplitRock an upcoming engineer in Karak Bardag. But as an engineer who wants to go looking for ancient artifacts long lost to the hold, the warband was an excellent way to do this before returning to the hold and really settle there with his skills.
The rest of the warband consists of a thunderer, Grom Blacksmoke, they picked up along the way and a beardling, Harri Longbeard, who is quickly becoming battle hardened after experiencing some encounters and skilled for driving a cart.
The goal for Bjorgir is to gather as much wealth as possible and driving home a cart full of riches. The borderlands and Cathay in particular should be the country where not much dwarfs ventured but it is famed for riches and fortune.
Last night they arrived here in this bordertown and it seems some information on a cash of Cathayan silks was to be found here. “OK, Durri and Loki, only questions to these poor villagers, no breaking stuff and specifically no DRINKING!” Bjorgir was instructing, “We don’t want to scare these poor people here.”

A house to house search started and the first houses some questions came with handy answers. In one house Durri got a bit too excited and menacingly came close to one of the villagers. With two big dwarf axes only inches from your nose, you’d be very willingly telling of anything you know, especially when there’s a big bulky dwarf with a very angry looking bright orange crest behind these axes.
While going from house to house Grach was getting up the stairs alongside one of the buildings to the second floor and saw some activity at the other side of this cluster of houses. Some odd forms were flowing between the buildings. Also some screams and shouts were audible. “Was that a guy with tentacles?” Grach was thinking, “Am I seeing this correctly?”

Discarding the strange viewing and subjecting it to last night’s drinking he went further with his investigations. Still some strange noises and screams seem to be emerging from the other houses. Upon leaving a house after questioning the inhabitants, at the far end of the street a group of weird deformed looking men were eying the dwarfs. In moments some unwieldy forms flowed towards the dwarfs and a fight broke out. One of the slayers was occupying 4 Possessed life forms and wielding his axes like a madman.
Meanwhile Bjorgir was getting around the back of the other houses to get the last pieces of information and soothing the people living here. At the front lots of battle noises filtered through and the Noble couldn’t wait to get outside and join his fellow dwarfs.
Outside the engineer was shooting away at the Possessed and the slayer might have found his doom if it wasn’t for the wallop he got from the lowlife Posessed leaving him without his axes. There’s no honor in these Possessed.
Eventually due to some chaotic bookkeeping on the Possessed side and quick thinking of the dwarfs on getting around the back to get information, the dwarfs found all pieces of the puzzle and the battle was over.
A lot of casualties on the dwarf side and none to be seen on the Possessed side, so who really won the battle? Luckily all but one dwarf recovered from their injuries.
At least some new entries into the book of Grudges for the dwarfs and there was gold to be had for all this new found information. Grom Blacksmoke and Crumble Dubnose were already discussing where to get a ponywagon for transporting all their new found ritches. This until Bjorgir came between and firmly laid out new plans to first equip the warband better and look for new warband members before really starting out to accumulate all these treasures to be found in the borderlands. With more warband members they could not only get to the treasure but also defend the treasure already in their possession.
In the end they looked for and bought new axes for Loki and found a replacement for poor Harri Longbeard as well as a thunderer who wanted to join the Alequaffers.