Reylissa brushed away the still-blistering scrap of pseudofabric. It was warm, wanting to glue itself to the back of her glove, but she shook it away, scowling as it disintegrated into ash. Danika hadn't really needed to torch the thing - it was no face-hugger - but the thick-armed heavy liked burning things. The juve squinted across the ruined stonework they were crossing at their ward. This von Cage, dressed in robes and carrying a very fine staff. There was something Danika should burn. The old man stank of blood, even to Reylissa's inexperienced nose for these things. But he also stank of money, so here she was, escorting the old fool through the rotting domes of Rustwater Gulch...
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| deployment - a long-abandoned dome |
This Sunday just gone, I had my
second game of 2025 against
long-time usual opponent Mangs, half of over half the
battle reports here. I should make some more friends.
Mangs is always a good opponent, generously letting me take lots of photos and notes on our games. This was Necromunda, an opportunity for me to finally bring out the ex-Slave Ogryns which I painted -- in 2022, sweet lord. These are a really fun gang to use, being incredibly daft (as we'll see) but also very hard to stop (as we'll see). Plus, Necromunda is always a great game, especially if you play it like Mangs and I do - starting gangs only, no fucking Tactics cards, relatively WYSIWYG. I'm sure we'd both like to do a campaign one day, but this style avoids a lot of the Modernhammer problems with the game (scale creep, Tactics cards, etc).
Mangs brought Valeria Sly and the Nightshade Crew, who we've met before over in Ghast Grove:
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| Nightshade Crew |
The mission? Escort Guilder agent von Cage. Should be easy money, unless there are ex-slaves in the area who are looking for revenge...
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| Kanathion von Cage (from Mangs's collection) |
DEPLOYMENT
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| Helreach United Miners, Fabricators, Haulers |
Overboss R-4 'Scarred Gills' heard that von Cage, an agent of the people who had enslaved him and his brothers, was vulnerable to ambush. He led his team up the left flank of the battlefield, right into the guns of the Eshin mercenaries. The lads could take it. They're tough.
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| Nightshade Crew |
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| More Nightshade Crew |
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| abandoned industry scattered in the eons-old ruins |
The ruins of some ancient township forced Sly to split her gang into two rough teams, intending to pincer out the Ogryns in an aggressive counter. Sheer numbers of hot-shot ought to put paid to the abhumans...
TURN ONE
R-4 throws an incendiary charge downfield. He misses Danika, but that hardly matters with a 5" template; she's clipped and her fine blue synthsuit catches fire instantly. All those chemicals from her flamer!
Of course, it's R-4's only charge, as he fails the ammo check.
Some long-range fire from the Eshin light up the ruins, but little damage. Underboss J-Ω 'the Joiner' is hit by a couple of lucky shots, pinning the big guy in place as he ducks his head.
OTHER TURNS
Yeah, I didn't keep track of which turn is which, so some of this might have to be figured out through context. Activation-based systems do make that a little tricky to remember, as well as not giving me enough downtime for photos!
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| storm-welders are truly terrible weapons |
W417 'Freedman' opens up at long range with his storm-welder, which immediately and catastrophically explodes and takes him out. Totally hilarious. Exactly what I expected. 10/10
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| burn baby |
Danika, her gear lit up, runs around and gets both pinned, prone, and takes a flesh wound from the fire. She's in a real bad spot...
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| long shot |
Sly tries a long shot with her bolter at J-Ω, but misses. In his next turn (no photo), J-Ω charges and easily takes out the prone and injured Danika.
G-0G and MA-G-0G move up toward the bulk of the Crew. What's left of their minds means they aren't great at taking cover, but merely standing behind the bulk of the rotting machinery means they're a little harder to shoot.
Crouching behind a rotting wall crusted in rust-fungus, Phoebe takes a long shot at R-4 with her shotgun. The solid state shell thunks into the abhuman's chest, smashing through his industrial gear and hurting like the dickens - but not enough to even really count as a flesh wound...
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| hello |
G-0G lumbers up to Dash and Carli, who back away from the cyborg, laser and autogun fire lighting up the dim ruins.
Meanwhile, MA-G-0G activates his stimulants and sprints over to Cutty. Her makeshift barricade of a former promethium refining system tube does not save her from the abhuman abomination's incredible reach. His massive spanner cracks across the top of her head, knocking her clean out.
Carli, on the other hand, opens up with her autogun on full-auto. She gets three shots, two of which punch through poor G-0G's overalls, causing serious injury to the former slave.
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| posted this in discord but it wasn't in the google drive! |
A careful bolter shot from Sly slams into J-Ω, causing him to duck his head again, but the explosive round failed to detonate properly!
Reylissa fires into MA-G-0G to avenge her sister, but despite the point-blank range, her nerves and inexperience tell and the bullets go wild.
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| got you now!! |
Smarting from Phoebe's shell, R-4 activates his stimms. False strength coursing through his mutant veins, he charges from the ruins into von Cage...
Sparks flying, there is a flare as the displacer field interacts with the arc-welders...
..flinging von Cage's shattered, burned corpse clear across the field. It slams into a broken bulkhead, a red smear adding a brief touch of colour to the desolate underhive. (I got four hits, S9, D3 - and he saved two.)
Technically the game ends once the escort target either dies or is exfiltrated, but we decided to finish the turn, as it seemed silly for the game to end in the middle of a firefight. No photos, but MA-G-0G charges Carli and takes her out smoothly (rolled Out of Action immediately!). Dash charges into the injured G-0G and kicks him in the computer, coup-de-gracing him. Reylissa then moved up behind MA-G-0G and railed him with bullets, hurting him but not much...
Valerie and R-4, realising there is no point to the fight, call off hostilities and mutually break. They've hurt each other pretty badly, and von Cage has been electro-crushed to death. No point in continuing!
AFTERMATH
A great game, and good to see Mangs again - it's been a few months, what with Arthur (the little one, not the union boss) and all. We've made plans to have a game of Kill Team, but adulthood being what it is, that looks like May. Yikes.
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| J-Ω checks his email |
