Tag Archives: fantasy

Fantasy Gallery #1

15mm fantasy figures, based for Hordes of The Things (HOTT) or Fantasy Rules! (FR!). Many of the figures are long-out-of-production Ral Partha 15mm (from when they held the AD&D license, before WotC bought AD&D from TSR and started producing plastic crap); the rest are a mix of Reaper & Ral Partha 25mm monsters and Chariot 15mm (now produced by Magister Militum/Navigator.
Continue reading Fantasy Gallery #1

Links: Fantasy Wargaming

Chipco’s Fantasy Rules! Links

Hordes of the Things & Misc. Fantasy Links:

Related Links:

  • Dan Smith’s Fantasy Fonts for Windows has Tolkein-inspired and other fantasy fonts, plus lots of related links.
  • Flat Earth Games have very cool fonts and other gaming information. Beautiful looking site, as well. [DEAD LINK?]
  • Warflags has free flags for wargamers – they’re intended as historicals, but a number of them work all right as fantasy flags, especially the mediaeval ones.
  • Leonardo da Vinci – diagrams, drawings, & models of his work, including many of his fascinating machines.
  • Town of Vinci’s Leonardo Museum has information and loads of great diagrams. Vinci was Leonardo’s hometown…
  • The Myths & Legends pages have good information on real-world dieties, myths and legends. Useful to inspire your fantasy-world mythos.
  • Information & Links on real-world Ancient Civilizations. More inspiration.
  • Worlds in the Net is a catalog of people’s fantasy and science fiction worlds on the WWW.
  • Xenite.Org: Worlds of Imagination on the Web – Science fiction & fantasy.
  • RPGnet has loads of interesting links and information, including a good review of FR! 2ed.
  • Lots of amusing RPG stories – should probably be called “Stupid Gamer Tricks”…or sometimes “Stupid GM Tricks”… [DEAD LINK?]
  • Not a fantasy wargames site either, but L-Space is the best Terry Prachett site going. Wonderful site if you’re a Pratchett fan. (Who isn’t?)
  • Sir Clisto Seversword’s Tome of Adventure & Knowledge – the site isn’t quite as long as the name, but nearly! This is a medieval-themed collection of links, very well sorted and indexed. Lots of good stuff. [DEAD LINK?]
  • Tempus Peregrinator’s Little Heraldry Book is a good heraldic primer, glossary and dictionary, online with good links.
  • The Medieval Sword Resource Site is a sort of online museum dedicated to the medieval swordsmith’s art. Great links, information and images.
  • Landsknecht.com is actually an SCA site, which has loads of information, links and images for Renaissance warfare.
  • The Dwarven Delving is an RPG site, but it’s got great images and some entertaining information on everyone’s favourite short axe-wielders!

Tony’s Undead FR! battle report

This is a battle report from the old Warbard – Corey

Tony wrote this battle report after our most recent FR! game, the first in which his Undead appeared.

“When an invading force crosses a river in its onward march, do not advance to meet it in midstream. It is best to let half the army get across and then deliver your attack” – Sun Tzu, The Art of War.

On Wednesday night, Brian, Mike, Darren and myself played out a 750 point FR! battle. Mike and I allied against Brian and Darren.

It was cool to finally get a game with some undead on the table. I had some lucky rolls, but overall I was pleased with how they played. They are pretty tough to kill (being undead and all), and demoralization is a waste of time. I did manage to summon one unit back, although it was rather difficult. I always find that few spells go through in FR! Part of it is that the army pool is always so much bigger than the second level magic users pool, so it is easier to dispell than cast.

It is tough to say where the battle was won or lost. I think that the western side where Mike was was decided by his massed archers. That gave him the ability to sit on the south shore of the river and fire arrows at the dwarves. That destroyed one unit, and broke up the line enough that his troops could get across the river. Also, Brian had a series of abysmal rally rolls…

On the eastern side, the early loss of the battlewagon was disheartening for the dwarves. They never really recovered from that. The skeletons were able to prevent the human villagers from attacking the flank, and managed to roll really well in combat. By the time the wolves were in striking distance, that part of the battle was already over, with only one dwarven unit left standing.

Tony

Three-player FR! – Capture the Flag!

This is a battle report from the old Warbard – Corey

This is a battle report from this summer – I wrote it up for the Chipco List, but just found it again and realized I’d never HTML’d it. Here it is, then. Enjoy!

Had an interesting 3-way FR! fight last night – three 750pt low magic armies, racing to grab an ‘alien artefact’ that was in the center of the table in a stone circle.

The ‘Capture the Flag’ format works really well for more-than-two-player matchups. It was close and tense right until the end!

The armies this time were Dwarven, Medieval human, and Orc/goblin. First turn, the humans Flew a HW w/ Hero into the stone circle, grabbing the artefact. The rest of the forces raced toward the center, with Orc forces moving to block the human’s retreat.

The Orc wolves and wolfriders hit the flanks of teh human force, while the orc infantry and the dwarves faced off up on the central hill and the human HW w/ the artefact ran as hard as they could – the humans couldn’t manage another Flight spell.

The dwarven infantry blew away the orcs & goblins, swiftly reducing them to utter rout, but the humans deployed a few units in a screen to stop the dwarves, sacrificing them to get the HW w/ artefact marched off the table. Damned close – the humans left the table at One on the Morale Clock…

The Dwarves were left in possession of the field, but the humans had the powerful mystic artefact!

If you want to do multi-sided FR!, I really recommend trying the Capture the Thing idea – makes for a really good game.

The advantage of a “Capture the Flag” game is that it doesn’t make any sense to hang back – you either want to grab the ‘flag’ first, or go beat on the guy who grabbed the flag and grab it from him.

The other thing to do (ahem…) is have a beer with your game… puts you in that “charge…charge…charge!!” medieval frame of mind! If you’re running an actual Medieval army – knights and all – have two beers. (but not if you’re driving home right afterward, of course…)

Gladius & Axe: Roman Early Imperial Legions Vs. Dwarven Axedwarves

This is a battle report from the old Warbard – Corey

Neil and I had a very interesting FR! battle on Sunday – 1000pts of Dwarves vs. 1000pts of Romans. These are the two ultimate Handweapon armies – fairly small battlelines of really, really good troops. My Dwarves had a Light-Artillery equipped Battlewagon, a flying Small Monster, 1 Elite HW, 8 regular HW and 3 crossbow units. The crossbows had stakes, and the regular HW all had Bombs. Two Traps filled out the list.

Neil’s Romans were an entirely ‘straight’ historical early Imperial army – a line of Elite HW Legions with throwing weapons, backed by bow-armed Skirmishers, with some throwing-weapon equipped Mobs and Light & Heavy Cav as support, and one light artillery piece.

What was really unique was that the Romans had no magic user at all, while the Dwarves had a Level 2 War Cleric. As it turned out, this mattered less than you might think. The Romans stubbornly refused to believe that magic was really happening, it seems – using just their Army Pool, and some luck, they stopped the bulk of my spells in their tracks!

The battlefield was quite crowded – a very large hill and a pair of smaller hills dominated the center of the field, with a river and small forested area off on one flank.

Roman setup had the Legions, skirmishers and light arty. together in line, at the back of the large hill. The mobs deployed along the bottom of the large hill, and the cavalry deployed farther out along the flanks, the bulk of it on the right flank.

Dwarven setup was my standard Dwarven setup – a line of 6 HW, with refused flanks of crossbows & HW and a pair of HW behind the main line as reserves. The battlewagon was on the right flank with two of the CB units, facing down the Roman cavalry. I`ve found that this double-refused flank with reserves setup works very well with Dwarves, and helps protect this slow-moving army`s flanks very well.

Both armies advanced slowly toward each other, the Dwarven light arty getting a couple of shots in, but the Roman artillery being masked by the bulk of the hill they were behind.

The Dwarven wargod`s Avatar, summoned by the War Cleric, howled forward and engaged the Legion`s righthand units, being banished shortly but throwing that flank into terrible disorder. Down on the flat, the Dwarven CB deployed their stakes and faced down the Roman cavalry, with both Traps holding units stationary for turn after turn, securing the flank. The battlewagon had charged forward to attack the cavalry, being eventually surrounded and destroyed but fighting grimly for many turns and leaving the cavalry in disarray.

The first clash of the infantry battlelines was thunderous – Dwarven Bombs versus Roman pilum and shortbow, with the bombs destroying the center of the Legion`s line, including the light artillery piece. Although the Dwarves were fighting uphill the whole time, they generally prevailed, gradually grinding the Legion down, although not without cost.

One notable (although temporary) setback for the Dwarves came when a valiant Roman mob beat a Dwarven HW unit twice, throwing it back off the hill in disorder, although not destroying it.

On the left flank, the Dwarven flying small monster (a small Silver Drake) had flown forward and destroyed the only Roman Light Cavalry unit on that flank, while HW & CB units slowly flattened the Roman mobs.

The Dwarven general challenged a Roman Hero to a duel, but the craven Roman, muttering something about `…being an officer, not a duelist, dammit…` went and hid in the rear ranks. The Roman general had more guts – and, as it turned out, more skill, slaying the Dwarf general in epic single combat. The Dwarven axers where not much dismayed, however, and continued to battle it out with the Legions, although both armies where now very much in disorder. (Both armies had been chasing each other down the moral clock, with the Dwarves hitting 4 first, then stopping at 3 while the Romans continued to fall…)

The turning point came when the Dwarven Silver Drake shook off it`s fatigue and soared over the Roman lines, terrifying and then destroying first a unit of skirmishers and then a Legion HW unit, while at the same time the Dwarf War Cleric convinced the wargod to return, slaying one of the trapped Roman Heavy Cav units. Dwarven axers continued to fight grimly, and some sembelence of order was imposed on sections of the Dwarven line.

All of this was too much for even valiant Legionnaires to take, and the Romans fell back, ceding the field to the Dwarven forces!

< Previous Battle Fantasy Games Next Battle >

Thoughts on ‘Magicless’ FR! Games: I’m not going to claim that magic had no effects at all on this fight – the Dwarven wargod’s Avatar was instrumental twice, although he didn’t stick around a long time. Part of this has to do with the peculiar nature of the War Cleric’s spells – the bulk of them are far more subtle and tactical, so that while they can change the outcome of the game, they’re not going to do it single-handedly. Even if you had a more distructive spellcaster – the Fire Shaman comes to mind – the deciding factor of the battle is always the actual clash of units, and usually the clash of battlelines.

It also shows off, I think, the integrity of the FR! ruleset – the tactical, combat part of the rules are sound enough, and the magic is not generally overpowering, so that a pure tactical combat army – which is what Neil’s Romans were – can still give a magic-enhanced army a stiff fight. This game, as I said in the report, was neck-to-neck almost right to the end. A really great game!

Grashnek da Uruk on Unbolg’s big raid into ‘uman territ’ry

This is an old battle report from the original Warbard – Corey

We had a Medieval Human vs Orc FR! fight Tuesday (April 27, 1999), and I’ve finally written a battle report. This one’ s from the Orc point of view (after all, victors write history, right?) and I had a lot of fun writing it!

The fight was a 750pt Orc army vs a 750pt Medieval army.

Grashnek da Uruk on Unbolg’ s big raid into ‘ uman territ’ ry

So, da big boss Unbolg, he decide dat de Dwarfs, dey’ re entire too tough. Lousy eatin’ and dem buggers is bloody good fighters, too. Dey maul de Tribe when we last went into Dwarf territ’ ry, so Unbolg look for easy pickins.

He say he found good target for da raids in territory of ‘ uman lady, da Duchess of Sout’ fold. Humans is better eatin’ an’ da horse is better eatin’ still, sez Unbolg. Da snagas go “Whoo-hoo!” – it don’ t take much to get dem snaga excited. Me, I tink damn kniggets on big damn ‘ orse is pretty mean, but Unbolg got ‘ dat look’ , mean and set in ‘ is ways. It’ s why ‘ e’ s still da Boss.

So we wanders into ‘ uman territ’ ry, a big mob of da snaga, a bunch of us uruk, lots o’ dem mad frotin’ -at-da-mout’ wargs, some wit’ snaga ridin’ dem, and a couple a dem big, big trolls. Boy, do dose troll buggers stink! Unbolg was da Boss, o’ course, and I’ m like da other kinda boss, cause I’ m meaner dan most, and I gets to carry da big big Banner, wit’ flames all over it. We had dat mad bugger Graz and ‘ is drum, and dat ‘ orrible little snaga fire shaman, cause for a snaga ‘ e’ s mean, and ‘ e’ s got a way wit da fire. A bunch of dem archer-uruk came, too.

We come up over a bunch a hills, an dere’ s dis little village of da ‘ umans, wit lots a dere peasant types running’ away when dey sees da big Banner overhead! We kinda start chargin’ toward da village, wit’ da wargs and da snaga-riders on da sides and dose stoopid archers ahead. Calls demselves Uruk, dey do! Da cheek of it!

Den dere’ s big, big walls of flame and all ‘ orribleness in front of us! Da snaga charge at it, but dere afraid, no surprise dere. Dere was a damned ‘ uman mage or sommat in da area! So we kinda move to da left, up onto da hill, wit’ da snaga in front and us uruk behind, and da archer types even farther ahead.

Da archer-types, dey say ders great big bloody ‘ orses on da plain, all covered in cloth and wit’ guys in armour on da backs of ‘ em! Da bloody ‘ uman knights ‘ ad showed up, and dey were gonna fight! Dere was ‘ uman footmen wit’ da big swords down dere as well, but da mad warg poured all over dem and dey wasn’ t doing so good.

Graz da Mad an’ ‘ is drum lead a couple mobs o’ snaga into da town, and da snaga on wargs are goin’ round da far side, and da little shaman, ‘ e sez for sure ders a damn ‘ uman mage in da area, cause ‘ e can feel da spells. Dere’ s more flames and ‘ orribleness in front of us, but da Boss Unbolg he sez to charge da flames, dat dere fake like! So we do, an’ ya know, dey were fake?! Damn ‘ uman mage, ‘ e could only do illusions like!

Da archers were shootin’ at da knights on da plain, and dey actually brought a bunch o’ dem down, filled full o’ arrows! Damn good, I’ ll say, even if dey ain’ t uruk! Da shaman, ‘ e was keepin’ da ‘ umans confused wit’ big damn walls o’ flame and by makin’ ‘ em all real hot, so dey couldn’ t move like. Dat shaman was pretty hot, ya know?

Da snaga ridin’ warg were away on da side, but we could see dem messing wit’ some knights, running around dem an’ shootin’ , and dem knights couldn’ t catch dose fast wolves, so dat was looking pretty good.

Da ‘ umans were gettin’ a bit discouraged, I tink, and mebbe slowin’ down a bit, but dey was still tough basterds, and da batch dat came ‘ round da forest ahead of us, dey were even tougher looking, and dat Duchess, she was wit’ dose knights, so dey’ d fight real good! Da shaman cast lots o’ walls a flame, and cut da mean-looking knights off, but da other knights ran over da last o’ dose mad wargs, and nearly all da archer-types was run down as well, but da ‘ uman’ s were loosing, and dey knew it too.

Da end came wit’ out me even ‘ aving to fight, and I calls dat pretty good! Dose wolf-snagas swarmed all ov’ r some knights dat were fightin’ wit some snaga mobs, and da surrounded knights went down, and da rest kinda ran away, but dey left lots an’ lots o’ ‘ orses an’ ‘ umans on da field, so we had a good feed and got to plunder dat village, and it was pretty damn good, ya know? Dat village burned real nice, too.

< Previous Battle Fantasy Games Next Battle >

Postscript: I’m in the middle of reading “The Art of War in the Middle Ages” by Charles Oman (my light recreational reading of the moment) and ran across this passage:

“…each commander took his own route and made what speed he could, the French army arrived upon the field in dozens of small scattered bodies. These were attacked in detail, and in many cases routed by the Mamelukes. No general battle was fought, but a number of detached and incoherent cavalry combats had all the results of a great defeat. A skirmish…would overthrow the chivalry of the West, even when in went forth in great strength and was inspired…” (pg 59)

Now, substitute “Duchess of Westfold” for ‘French’ and ‘West’, and “Orcs” for ‘Mamelukes’, and we have a perfect snyopsis of Tuesday’s FR! fight between Tony’s medieval humans and my orcs and goblins!

“Art of War in the Middle Ages” is a great book – I highly recommend reading it.

Battle #2: The Duchess of Southfold’s War on the Dwarves

This is an old battle report from the original Warbard – Corey

750pt Dwarves (Corey) vs. 750pt Medieval Humans (Brian).

The Duchess of Southfold did declare war upon the Dwarves, declaring that Dwarves were offensive, thieving, braggartly, and furthermore were foul to look upon. Summoning a great host of knights (4 Knights), her personal knightly retinue (2 Elite Knights) a lesser host of lowly footmen (4 Handweapons, 1 Mob of peasants), and many of the great nobles of the land, including Sir Danel, Master of Horse (Hero w/ Exeptional Weapon), Sir Vilheim, Master of Foot (Hero) and the ignoble but skilled illusionist Sarnain (1st Level Illusionist Hedge Mage), she did lead her troops against the offensive Dwarves. (the Duchess was her own General.)

Greatly alarmed at this mighty host, the Thane of Greymount (General) mustered a great host of axedwarves (6 Handweapon), his personal Guard (1 Elite Handweapon), the crossbowdwarves (3 Xbow), a party of Bearriders (1 Hvy Cav, causes fear), and his great battlewagon (Battlewagon w/ Hvy Arty). The great heroes of the realm accompanied him (2 Heroes), as did a Cleric of the Wargod (1st Lvl War Cleric).

The human army moved through great woods towards the River Flueve, which was entirely fordable at this, the height of summer. The footmen did hang back, not desiring to combat the superior Dwarven forces, whilst the great body of Knights, lead by the Duchess and her Master of Horse and the illusionist Sarnain, did crash through the forest in hope of outflanking the Dwarves.

The Dwarves had drawn up their great infantry battleline, with crossbows on the flanks and a smaller party of axedwarves in reserve, and hoped to move forward to contact the knights whilst they were still struggling to leave the river. Sarnian, however, skillfully cast illusions, which had the appearance of great walls of flames, and did prevent much of the movement the Dwarves had hoped to make.

Thus the knights were able to cross the river and deploy unmolested, and form up great ranks to thunder upon the Dwarves, spitting them with lances and trampling them underfoot. The knightly ranks did wrap entirely around the Dwarven line, and the further part of the Dwarven line fell before the knights, yet the knights were greatly in disarray from their charge, and there were still many Dwarves upon their flanks.

Furthermore, a party of Dwarven Bearriders had come over a great hill and fallen upon the human footmen far behind. The great warrior Vilheim, who was Master of Foot for the Duchess, slew the Dwarf Razan Bearrider in epic single combat, but was lost when the vengeful Bearriders destroyed his men about him. Despite their loss and the terror the bears stirred in men’s guts., the footmen continued to hold off the Bears.

All might still have been lost if it had not been for the skillfully cast illusions of Sarnian, who made it seem as if great lines and walls of fire blocked the Dwarven advance, thus allowing the knights to dress their lines and fall upon the enemy again. Thus trapped between great lines of knights and the river, their own lines in terrible dissarray, the Dwarves fled, or fell, or surrendered, each according to his own fate.

More battle reports coming soon.

HOTT Battle: The Second Part of the Grand Duke’ s War; or The Downfall of the Grand Duke.

This is a battle report from the old Warbard. The first part of the report is in The Duke of Erehwon’ s War with the Dwarves post. – Corey

Greatly angered, the Duke did muster the remaining warriors of Erewhon, mighty Knights and many stalwart swordsmen. He further did compel the greatest wizard of the Duchy, one Simarian the Piebald, to march with the army, and such was the anger of the Duke that even Simarian agreed to march.

Avoiding the River Flueve, and instead marching toward the Dwaerrowpass, the Grand Duke did encounter a Dwarven muster, lead by the great warleader Rastaz the Bearrider.

Through the wooded land the Grand Duke sent his forces. Half his knights he sent around, by devious routes, in hopes of catching the Dwarven border tower unawares, whilst the other half remained in reserve, behind the stalwart footmen of Erewhon, whom the Grand Duke lead personally.

The knights on the flank did fall upon and scatter a unit of the hated crossbowdwarves, and did press on to attack the borderpost, although pressed by Dwarven axers and ultimately unsuccessful in their attack on the stone tower. Forward, Rastaz sent the remainder of his crossbowers around the flanks, whilst his axers and he moved forward to destroy the invading humans.

The attack of the crossbowdwarves upon the flanks of the footmen did scatter and split their line, allowing the axedwarves to advance, bellowing terrible Dwarven warsongs as they attacked.

Rastaz and the Grand Duke met in single combat, and epic and mighty was the clash. For the Duke was the most skilled swordsman in his realm, and Rastaz was also greatly skilled with the sword, and was aided by his terrible warbear, before which men cowered.

At length, the rashness of the Grand Duke was proved upon his body, as Rastaz hew the ducal head from his body. Seeing their great leader fall, the remaining humans despaired, and fled or surrendered to the Dwarves.

With the might of Erewhon thus shattered upon the Dwarven anvil, the hosts of the Dwarven realm moved into the Duchy, intent on punishing the humans for warmongering. After eating many horses and burning down part of the capital town to get the attention of the humans, the Dwarven lord did install a new Duke, and a great treaty was made for him to sign. Thus forbidden to wage war upon the Dwarves, deprived of lands around the River Flueve, and stripped of the title ‘Grand’, the new Duke of Erewhon was proclaimed.

The body of the old Grand Duke was buried under a great stone which read, in dwarfrunes and human script, “Thus perish all Enemies of Dwarves”. The Dwarves ate his horse.
The Duke's Burial Stone

HOTT Battle: The Duke of Erehwon’s War with the Dwarves.

This is a battle report from the old Warbard. The second part of the report is in The Second Part of the Grand Duke’ s War; or The Downfall of the Grand Duke post. – Corey

The last Grand Duke of Erewhon was a mighty man, a fell warrior and great leader. He had the vice of greed, however, and did greatly covet the wealth of the Dwarven realm in the mountains above Erewhon. Seizing upon customs infractions by Dwarven traders as his flimsy public excuse, the Grand Duke gathered the warriors of Erewhon to plunder and invade the Dwarven Realm.

Gathered he the mighty Knights of Erewhon, nobles all, mightily armoured and enhorsed, so stupendous that the thought of defeat occurred not to them. The stalwart swordsmen were also mustered, and the rabble of the fields were pressed into the Duke’ s service. This mighty host, with splendid banners flying, marched towards the River Fleuve to do battle with the Dwarves.

The Dwarves of the borderguard were all on foot, their axes shining in the sun. Rank upon solid rank, all garbed in their Dwarflord’ s colors. Towards the bridges over the River Fleuve the humans came, the Knights thundering towards the Great Bridge of Dwarven make, the footmen having to contend themselves with a smaller human-made bridge.

The Knights who thundered over the Greatbridge, confident of victory, were met with hails of deadly bolts, and turned back by Dwarven crossbowers, who cared not a whit for the magnificence of Knightly trappings. They knew simply that knights were big targets, and that roast horse was a Dwarven delicacy!

With the Greatbridge thus secure, the Dwarven infantry moved on toward the human footmen, who were crossing on the lesser bridge. The two lines crashed together, and the thunder of the battle rose high, human sword against Dwarven axes. The battle swayed back and forth, the two lines reeling, recoiling and charging.

But more numerous were the Dwarves, and they did overlap the Erehwon troops, driving them back toward the riverbank and gradually away from the bridge. All valour and the personal bravery of the Grand Duke notwithstanding, the humans were quite crushed, many falling to flashing axes or drowning in the swift river. The Grand Duke himself barely escaped over the river.

Soaking wet and in peril of his life, he did vow revenge upon the beastly dwarves, and did slink back to drip upon his throne and call for a new muster of the men of Erewhon.

HOTT battle report from a friend

This is a battle report from the old Warbard – Corey

These two battles were fought between myself[Brian] & a friend; they were his first and second Hordes games. He later wrote this battle report and sent it to me. It makes a nice change from the three Dwarven-propaganda ones I wrote!

In the first battle, I set up with my swordsmen in the centre, with two groups of two knights on the flanks. The [human] army was led by the mage Dughan the Smitten. Bardur’s army of dwarves stood before the gates of their fortress, drinking and laughing at the preposterousness of the skinny folk across the field. The Human knights rushed forth and charged the dwarven crossbowmen, and were crushed for their daring effort. With the Dwarven airboat, “Flight of Gandeer”, harassing the right flank, Bardur Stormhammer challenged the magician to settle their differences, man to dwarf. Of course, Dughan, remembering his mentor’s warning never to mess with a drunken dwarf, turned poor Bardur into a mole! Greatly distressed, the remaining dwarves carried their Hero back to the stronghold in the Iron Goblet. The dwarves shall not forget that magic is for more than the pansy elves ever again…

Several days followed with the dwarven smiths forging runes to remove the hex on Bardur, then the humans again assaulted Bardur’s stronghold. Bardur, remembering his days as short-snouted rodent, was not so hasty to attack that dastardly magician. Instead, he sent his crossbow-armed dwarves after Dughan, who proceeded to run around the board in fear of the satanic devices of the heathen dwarves. Finally, Bardur had had enough! He called to his axedwarves to charge the scattered and segmented line of swordsmen. Unfortunately, his dwarves were unable to hear him over their excessive taunting of the fleeing sorcerer, and he ended up alone, surrounded by human swordsmen. Thus ended Bardur’s short reign as Lord of Gandeer’s Keep. May the Runes be with him.

Dughan, for what it’s worth, stole forty barrels of Bardur’s finest stout, and got very, very drunk. Unfortunately, he forgot to give the King his share in taxes, and was sent to the dungeon. He is still there to this day. And he is still drunk (dwarvish brews are well known for their potency, and many a lay has been sung about the hundred year hangovers that they tend to induce in the wine drinking elves). The dwarves of Gandeer’s Keep have sworn that the pickled blood of Dughan shall not go to waste, and that it shall be returned to them. By force if necessary. All forty barrels of it (with the impurities filtered out).