Prologue
Josef Bugman looked around the abandoned brewhouse with an apprising eye: the pipes were in disrepair and the vats cracked by the recent attack, but the kettle was sound, the cellars intact and the water up here was good. With enough time, he could cook up a decent little beer. But time was something he no longer had. None of them did.
"Last round, lads! Get it while you can." his sergeant, Snorri Budweiserson, was serving out the company's tankard on a long trestle table. Mugs of beer on one end, rows of throwing axes on the other. He wondered which would run out first.
Bugman accepted the mug and quaffed down a mouthful of Old Legend. Snorri did the same and they both let out long, contemplative belches.
"Don't seem right to me, chief," Snorri began. "Hunting the Kazaki'dum
is one thing, but why do we have to put ourselves in the middle of this fight?"
"The end is coming," said Bugman, the ale lending him farsight. "All we can do is join one fight or another."
"But why risk our lives for a tanglebeard like Stonehammer?" Snorri insisted. "We know the Kazaki'dum are being led by the survivor of Gallery #114. I heard rumour that it was no accident. They say that Stonehammer deliberately sealed the tunnel because of an argument with this Phlothos. He condemned sixteen dwarves to their deaths just to settle a feud."
"So they do say," said Bugman, walking slowly to the stone window frame. There was movement along the north end of the pass: a great horde of Kazaki'dum, accompanied by their monsters and war engines. Battle was about to be joined.
"So if this Phlothos wants revenge, I'd say Helgvist has it coming."
Bugman lined up his crossbow bolts, one after another, in a row on the window still. A huge, diseased monster on decaying leathery wings had just flapped to the front of the army and bellowed out a challenge in broken Khazalid.
"We all got it coming, laddie."
The Legend Reaches Its Height!
It's All-Skype Fight Night!
Tonight we conclude the campaign that began last October. What began as "hey, how about we write this battle as a narrative?" has blossomed, pustule-like, into a
seven-part tragic odyssey of Phlothos Orgmeier, champion of Nurgle, as he defies every race in the Warhammer world to stop him.
I, Stylus, will be fielding Dwarves as the final gatekeeper to his quest.
And I, Kraken, will bring Phlothos to his final resting place, amongst the legends in the hearts and minds of a thousand a select few readers.
Totting up the points over the last six battles, it seems that I need a very solid win to come out triumphant. Tough, but not impossible...
We're playing by our usual house rules (although refinements to the magic system are moot, as you will see), but have ramped up the scale to a finale-shattering 2,000pts. We'll be using boasts, and also the addition of 'anti-boasts' to encourage both warlords to finish this in the proper style.
- Dwarf anti-boast: -100VPs if Phothos is targeted by any war machine
- Warriors of Chaos anti-boast: -100VPs if Helgvist (or his unit) is targeted by magic
Prepare to strike out the grudge!
