Get your snacks ready, Underhivers, and top up your drinking tubes. Jarribix Klabbs here, and it's time for a meaty smackdown! With me tonight is the thing on my neck - say hello, Blaargh!
Jarri! Do the good folks at home know just how scary tonight's fight is?
I think you'd better tell them, Blaargh!
I can't! I'm too scared!
Blaargh's nerves are a little scattered before the match tonight, and you know, I can't say I blame him, folks. The first team tonight are some of the worst offenders this world has to offer. They've got an appetite for destruction and the skills to satisfy it - it's Murder Meat!
Real live cannibals, Jarri! I'm quaking in your boots!
Yes, Blaargh, it's deeply uncomfortable. This team represents the Corpse Grinder Cult. We've all heard about them, we all hoped the rumours couldn't be true. Surely nobody on Necromunda would stoop so low as to eat a dead body before it had been properly rendered down into nutritious paste? Well, these grisly gourmands don't have that kind of patience! Kasfunatu has paid off the enforcers to get this lot into the arena, and we aren't going to risk asking him why. Fast, frightening and lethal, Murder Meat want a cute/meet with your tasty feet!
They're monsters, Jarri!
Well, actually that would be the other team, Blaargh. If you thought ravenous maneaters were terrifying...
I really do!
...then you're going to want to avert your eyes from these genuine monstrosities. Let's not ask how Kraken managed to import them from the exclusion zone round Hive Secundus - it's a Malstrain Brood!
What... what are those things, Jarri?
Some of them were once simple hivers, Blaargh, now mere slaves to a warped alien hive mind. Most folks wouldn't want to go up against a Corpse Grinder at close range, but the twisted freaks leading this horror show aren't most folks - they might just savour the challenge!
I'm almost afraid to watch this!
I'd like to say you were made of sterner stuff, Blaargh, but I've seen your gelatinous innards. Yellow to the rotten core, folks, that's our Blaargh! Let's take a look at tonight's arena.
Hey, that's kind of serene, Jarri! Fancy a dip?
Don't be fooled by those limpid shallows, Blaargh, that's a potent mix of paint thinner, rancid fat and grox giblets. Sump diving is strictly for the birds, the less soluble ones at least. As ever, we've got our three lanes to fight over, some well-locked doors between them being given a last once-over by the ground crew before the match starts.
Hey, those aren't maintenance workers!
Sharp as ever, Blaargh - folks, it looks like Murder Meat has sneaked in a few of their junior members and stolen a march on the Malstrain! It's a ballsy move that could pay dividends or just lead to a fast demise. As the starting klaxon blares, I guess we'll soon find out!
Turn 1
Yeah, Jarri! Murder Meat are giving the brood scum a good grilling! Smokey! A Tyramite down!
It's the light roast that brings out the flavour. Shame it hasn't done more than that - there's quite a lot of the brood on hand there, and they're immediately swinging round to slap some firepower back at the fine young cannibals.
They really can't shoot, though!
Yes, it's like Stormtroopers for the Blind down there.
Pew pew puny, Jarri!
Got their attention, though!
Exactly, Blaargh, just what you'd expect from Corpse Grinders - a little early pressure to stop you from powering forwards, and as we can see from the map, their heavy hitters are rushing in on all three lanes compared to the Brood on a mere two. The other infiltrators are already trying to work the doors, too - in some cases, right off their hinges!
Scores: Corpse Grinders 1 (incursion into the enemy deployment zone), Malstrain 0
Turn 2
That's what I like to see, Jarr! The Brood have their toes on those ladders in the middle. Rung-a-dung-dung! Better hope there's no snakes!
Nobody's seen a real snake on Necromunda for centuries, listeners, but with the hallucinogenic fumes from that sump lake, you never know your luck. While we wait and see, the Brood seem to have given up on the left side altogether, leaving the Corpse Grinders to surge into the central chamber, where it looks like they're considering a move to the middle. You're seeing Initiate Cheese there using that banner pole to enrage his pals.
It really works! The way he sings 'duh-de duh duh durrr' and then jabs them with the pointy end? I'm not loving it!
Initiates Fries and Rings, the throwaway forward pressure, are both down now. We've just seen a genestealer in action - utterly lethal, a blend of toxic bites and razor-sharp claws that would be impressive if it weren't too fast to follow with the naked eye.
Woo! Was that another one?
The blur that blendered a third initiate over on the right must have been. And it looked like it was going to leap again, some Brood tactics in action there I think. King Burger, leading Butcher of Murder Meat, had his fat in the fire for a second as that genestealer went through his teammate and very nearly straight into him, but he'd judged his distance well. It's fallen just short, and the Malstrain are going to have to hope they can keep the initiative there, or the Corpse Grinders have a devastating counter-charge lined up...
Scores: Corpse Grinders 5 (2 each for middle and left), Malstrain 3 (2 for the right and 1 for two juves down)
Turn 3
Blaargh, so long as we see some good old fashioned mutilations going on here, I'm happy as a nomad in ash - and that's certainly what we've got here! King Burger has gone screaming into action and sent his lackeys with him. What carnage!
What do you call a genestealer with no arms, Jarr?
A Limbstolen, Blaargh, but King Burger is calling it lunch and I don't think anyone's going to argue with him. He's just chewed right through the Brood's leader, the two burly maniacs with him have seen off another two, although one of them has been clawed down in return. I can't see the Brood reclaiming the right flank after that disaster!
Again, lots of sound and fury from the Brood Scum guns, but it doesn't seem to signify much. That guy in the middle just missed an easy shot, he's paying for it as Zinger Tower, the skinner with the two-handed hook there, has piled right into him and....
Oh my septic aunt!
No!
Were those his...?
Look away, Blaargh!
I can't! The skinner's biting his...?
A pancreas shouldn't stretch like that!
He is! He's eating it! He's really eating it! Right through his nose!
Folks, words can't do justice to this Savage Brutality. I've seen lashworms at a fondue party make less mess. That Brood Scum's had his sweetbreads well and truly buttered, and his prairie oysters never had a prayer. Truly horrific stuff - even the alien constitutions of the Malstrain can't cope with such wanton atrocity, and their entire centre is running away!
I'm going to be seeing that in my sleep for weeks, Jarr!
My therapist will see it in hers!
Scores: Corpse Grinders 16 (6 for all three zones, 2 for a leader, 3 for a trio of champion genestealers, 1 for a pair of gangers9), Malstrain 4 (one for a second pair of gangers)
Turn 4
Yes, the Malstrain certainly seem to be gluttons for punishment. Only a few haven't recovered their nerve, the rest are piling back into the centre. Whatever weirdly pulsing flesh their Convergence is made of, it can't be brains, Blaargh.
Yeah, they're doing just what the Corpse Grinders want! There's going to be a feeding frenzy!
No blood in the water, though, Blaargh - the Malstrain have spore juice instead, and that sump has nothing as natural as water in it. All the same, it's a solid analogy!
Solid like the Grinders' lead!
Yes, they're really running away with this one, they've just taken down another batch of Brood Scum and the Convergence along with it. Sushi or pastrami?
Slushtreemy!
It really is game over for the Malstrain, there's barely any of them left. If there was more time on the clock, they'd probably be looking at the left side breaking all the way through to their backline. Luckily, Skinner McRib can't seem to see past the enormous meat mincer on his head to operate the safety controls on the energy barrier there.
He's a meaty blinder!
Turn 5
They'll be washing it out of the vents for weeks!
I highly doubt they wash anything down there, Blaargh, but your optimism does you proud. The only Malstrain still standing are those who ran far enough to avoid becoming steaks, and as Initiate Happy has just demonstrated with his harpoon gun, even running doesn't always help.
Too true - everyone loves fast food!
It's been the reddest whitewash this scavvy's ever seen! One heck of a high score, and for those of you still counting, the kills are nearly matching the calories. The Lord of Flesh and Sinew is going to be well pleased with this result!
Final Score: Corpse Grinders 29 (they got carried away and ran off one of the points, and there wasn't enough left to kill to get more than another point), Malstrain 5 (a second brace of gangers with a lucky shotgun hit)
Incredible scenes from an incredible battle, Blaargh, and plenty to digest. We might have had our fill, but the Corpse Grinders are clearly hungry for more!
Chicken, Jarri!
What about it, Blaargh?
Victory tastes like chicken!
I wouldn't know, Blaargh, I've never tasted either. Another qualifier brought to a brutal end, and it's time for us to leave you with a word from our sponsor!
H. Gorbu's Kill'n'Grill
Whatever you slew
It'll make a great stew
The Warthogs are back! Class of 2012!
ReplyDeleteYes! Deploying for possible the third time in their long and storied 12-year career!
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