Knockramunda Semifinal: Corpse Grinder Cult vs Cawdor

Jarri, I'm more jittery than a juve on flects! 

It might just be our shared metabolism, Blaargh, but I feel the tension too. It's the second and final semi-final night, Hivers, and we're out in the wastes!

The air is crackling, not least from the incoming electrical storm - it's the last chance for a place in the final, and our two teams are both determined to prove worthy. Let's meet them!

Meat's back on the menu, boys! Murder Meat are the Corpse Grinders with some bones to pick. Hungry for a win, or just good ol' hungry? I don't wanna get near enough to ask!

Up against them is another large group of barely legal cultists. House Cawdor and THOOK have made it this far through some gruelling qualifiers. Faith in the Emperor and plenty of fire - it's the Cawdor way, and they're here to represent!

Whoo-eeee, I sure don't like it out here in the wastes, Jarr. My agriphobia is acting up something wicked!

You certainly don't like farming, Blaargh, although it's possible you mean the wide open spaces. Down on this sump stop, there's plenty of neither. A maze of ruins with surprisingly few lines of sight along the ground, there's plenty of corners to lurk around. Ambushers take note!

Nothing complicated for our teams to puzzle over here, just straightforward murder. Or almost straightforwards! There's a little extra spice to tickle the tastebuds of our cannibal pals. Five crates of special sauce hidden in the ruins, and anyone carrying one can pickle a victim for double kill points!

What about the Cawdor, Jarr? They don't eat human flesh, do they?

No, that was Catholics. Fair play to the faithful, they can pray for divine intervention - 'And Lo, His Name Was Praised On High Scores'. Any kills scored by that supplicant in their subsequent action score triple, but it's a tough boon to get. Will the Cawdor use their faith on their more usual miracles, or gamble on the extra kill points?

Kill points are how you tell a winner from a loser here in the arena, folks. One for every two juves or gangers out of action, one for a champ or brute, two for a leader. 

Absolutely right, Blaargh, and the teams are desperate to get out there and start taking names. Who are we to stand in their way? 

That'd be the worst place to stand right now, Jarr! There's the Grinders, lining up with three teams on the southside. King Burger in the middle, with his icon-bearer Cheese, ready to run. Cutters McBig and Quarter Pounder are each heading up a pair of Skinners on either flank, and the centre's already packed with sneaky initiates, cutting the line for the buffet!

Setting up their full processional on the far side, the Cawdor have spread out across the whole arena. Aiming to meet King Burger face-to-terrifyingly-masked-face, Father Haque Cautery has a team of rat-slingers and blunderpolers in the middle. Deacon Mortlock and his crossbow have the left side covered, Deacon Gabriel Lecturn and his firepike are heading down the right. Fingers on your triggers, we're off!

Turn 1

Yeee-haaaay, look at 'em go! Like flies to a fatality!

We said they'd be coming for each other fast, and we weren't wrong! Only a couple of exceptions here and there - Mortlock has pinned a couple of the younger autophages in cover with his explosive payloads, although nobody's actually hurt. 

Booo!

The Corpse Grinders have their hearts set on some of the special sauce, though - initiate Family Bucket has grabbed the nearest vending machine, and he's lugging it back to King Burger. 

Tribute!

Nobody else has the range or the lines of sight to shoot, so this has been all movement and no action. 

Just like Momma Buboe's Strip Joint! 

We've all been there, Blaargh, we've all been there. 

Scores: Nope

Turn 2

Chack-bwoooom! Mortlock, I gotta get me a rocket crossbow! Tell me how!

More pyrotechnics from the good Deacon, and this time he's knocked one of the Grinder boys, Fries I think, out into the open. Bad news for the boyish butcher, he's in range of Mortlock's accompanying altar boys, and one of them has pounced on him and taken him down. Our first fatality!

Bless him father, for he's been skinned!

Pretty cautious movement from everyone else out there, though, the Grinders can't quite close the gap yet and they don't want to get caught in the open by the Cawdor flamers. 

Can't blame them there, Jerr, burning's a status symbol nobody wants. 

Plenty of walls to hide behind, at least. There's only one good vantage point on the whole map, the road bridge, and Onion Ring is up there with an autopistol, firing away as he snags another crate of sauce. Not remotely in range of anyone, but great to see his fighting spirit in action. 

What a shot! Peeow, right in the temple bells!

Down goes Thierry Narthex, giving an unusual new piercing by harpoonist Happy there, but that's about it for a surprisingly bloodless second round. Surely that's about to change?

Scores: 0.5 each, one minion apiece

Turn 3

The ranges are good, we're going to see some intent to harm any second - and here we go! McRib has gone sprinting in from the left side, slamming into the first Cawdor to reach the road and absolutely shredding him. 

Sblaaart! Giblets agogo!

What that has done is lined up a couple of the meateaters, though, and Eviscerator-wielder Deacon Grue

has leapt atop a pillar to unleash a wave of flame. McRib is fine, but just behind him is Quarter Pounder and the big guy is flame grilled!

Skawooosh! Crispy!

Ablaze but not disabled, he's flailing around like an epileptic lashworm, and I've got to say, even at this safe distance he smells just fantastic, Blaargh, I can begin to see where the Grinders are coming from on their dietary requirements. 

Too tough for my teeth, Jarr, I need puree. Good job the Cawdor brought the big saws!

The grinders are also proving pretty chewy out there. Lots of them being knocked down by incoming fire, but their leather aprons are draped over steel plate. The Cawdor might be putting them on the floor, but they keep getting up!

Fatal! That one's a fatal!

Good gravy, that's particularly gruesome - the walls are being festooned with entrails, genuine butcher bunting down there. Too much to stomach as the Corpse Grinders claim another victim, and one of the Cawdor has turned tail and fled at the sight. 

Ooohohohoo, you see what I see, Jarr?

I sure do, Blaargh, that's our first bomb rat of the night. Darting out from its owner's pocket and off towards the Corpse Grinders, it's not reached anyone but it's just a matter of time. 

King Burger shaking out his hamstrings and getting the sauce dispenser ready. He's taken the handover from his boy Bucket and Lord High Helmawr's Hairy Haunches, is that a turn of speed or is that a turn of speed!

I ain't seen a man run like that since Bad Mungo Spatchkock mistook the Ogryn laxatives for Second Best!

Straight through the Cawdor lines, right past Father Haque's bodyguards and he's going right for the holy roller himself. But he's short!

Noo! 

Just short, and what a gorgeous showpiece of carnage that could have been! Utterly unexpected and just but only just terribly misjudged. King Burger is right in the sights of the fanatics, he's played right into their hands!

Father Haque's not taking a confession. Anoint that heathen with some holy flame!

One more shrimp on the barbie!

But look, the fire's also hit the rat, and that's cooked the fuse! 

Blammunition! Kapop!

Another of the crusading Cawdor bites the dust, blown up from behind by the rat. As King Burger tries to smother the flames, it's not looking great for the Corpse Grinders right now. Mortlock's bow-zooka has a whole flank's worth of carnivores pinned down, and some of their best and brightest are burning merrily.

The Cawdor seem to be treading water more than burning down the houses, though, and they're already getting low on the flaming ammo. If they let up the pressure even for an instant, the Grinders will be back on their feet and the pious few aren't going to last long if they connect. 

So long as it stays violent, Jarr, I'm happy!

Scores: Cawdor 2, Corpse Grinders 1.5

Turn 4

The stakes are high and the steaks are frying. There's enough Corpse Grinders around to start putting out a few fires, and Quarter Pounder has been doused in waste ash by his buddy Royale there. As Mortlock picks off an advancing skinner with a swift krak shot, the cannibal cult are still struggling to connect. 

At point blank range, the acolytes and initiates are shooting up a storm nearby, but can they hit anything?

Aim like that, and you couldn't hit a Hive at two paces!

Truly abysmal shooting, or incredibly impressive dodging, its hard to tell from up here. 

Not over there, though! Whee-ew, that's a hit!

Lovely shot from Quarter Pounder there, he's hurled his rotary flensing saw right up with a strong over-arm action, and that's Deacon Grue one step closer to sainthood.

 

They're down and dirty in the street underneath. Just how I like it!

Rough brawling between heavily armed champions - we're seeing McRib hacking away with twin cleavers and somehow not quite managing to take Deacon Gabriel Lectern down. It's the bible bashing we didn't know we needed - and look at that! 

Right in the tenderloin!

Distracted by the Deacon's Cherub, the big Cutter has been flanked and staked. Pierre Pew there for the kill, he's racked one up for Cawdor!

Father Haque must be wishing there was more like that out there!

Yes, the head Friar is in big trouble. His flamer's out, he's praying and spraying the autogun end of that combi-crozier, but nothing doing. King Burger is up, the fire on his skin is out but the fire in his eyes is definitely not, and the nearby Cawdor can't even bring themselves to shoot at him he's so scary. He's running at Father H, twin blades swinging and...

Baptised!

Down goes the chief priest, but not quite out. That's a surprise, King Burger has left him alive, and the crowd's gone a little quiet there. 

Yeah, what gives? Why no disembowelling?

Ah - that's why.  He's going back for the secret sauce!

Condimentory!

Scores: Cawdor 3, Corpse Grinders 3

Turn 5

I tell you what, Blaargh, there's some fantastic action going on out there. I've just seen a harpoon go through an acolyte's inner sanctum, there's a shotgunner being bludgeoned to death with a meat hammer. Someone just dropped from a gantry, someone else is on fire and I think a man even miraculously just rose from the dead. 

Hell of a match, Jarr!

I don't know about you, Blaargh, because despite that, despite this incredible carnage we're honoured to witness, I think there's only one moment anyone's going to remember from this semi-final. 

Yes sirree, it's going to keep me warm inside all the years of my life, Jarr. I'm tearing up just talking about it. 

Leak away, Blaargh, some discharges are well-earned. Scummers and sloppers, hivers and jivers, where were you the night you saw a semi-final settled by a badly-burned cannibal wielding a vending machine against a semi-conscious man of the cloth?

Jarribix, I'm going to die a happy blister. 

Not if I die first, Blaargh, not if I die first. 

Final Scores: Cawdor 4, Corpse Grinders 8

What a result, what a match, it's a victory for the Corpse Grinder Cult but really the winner here is Knockromundout. A sated hush has fallen over the stadium as Murder Meat settle down for a human beanfeast, and I'm genuinely moved to have been here to see it. Incredible stuff, just incredible. 

And edible!

That means it's an all-chaos endgame, Helots versus Grinders. Not a single greater House has made it through to glory. Is this what the future holds for all of us on Necromunda? The rise of chaos and the death of the status quo?

Who cares when it's this much fun!

Blaargh is on the money as ever, Hivers. No Future, but one hell of a show on the way out. You won't want to miss it, we certainly won't - see you at the final!