Who's Who in Mortenhoff

Greetings!

Before I plunge into a series of battlereports from the new Shadestorm Campaign and some follow-up articles to the Long One, I'd like to dedicate a post to the setting of the very first Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay game I ever Gamemastered: Mortenhoff Campaign.

As seen in the lengthy feed of this blog's posts, every now and then I pop out a new version of the novel-style story I'm writing about the group's adventures. The Mortenhoff Chronicles, as the project is handily called, tells the story of my first group of Player Characters as they live their rather exciting lives in the Old World.

But who' who in this campaign setting I write an entire novel about? This post is here to answer that.

The location of Mortenhoff, a rather well-doing village east of Middenheim.

Memory in the Mortal Realms

Greetings!

It's been a while since I last wrote up something for the Ponderings section of the blog, so here it comes:

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapters 1 to 5

Greetings!

I am happy to inform you that my WFRP 2nd Edition campaign has progressed quite a bit this year, and I have managed to write the Mortenhoff Chronicles up to date with our finished sessions!

Below you will find two links, one to the brand new fifth chapter of the book, and another featuring the entire book from the very beginning to the end of this most recent chapter. Even if you have read/downloaded/skimmed through the previous files featuring as much of the story as had been written back then, I highly recommend you take this new one as well. Why? Because I've had my players read it through in search of typos and other errors, all of which have been fixed in this latest installment.

Those of you who have been reading the previous chapters will already be familiar with my campaign's player characters:
- Nywon Nuntius, a human scribe
- Toga, a human protagonist
- Dracoh Rigulah, a human cadet
- Kalós Malákas, a human pit fighter
- Mellion, an elf apprentice wizard

In chapter four the group got drawn into a feud between a priest of Morr and a travelling plague doktor in the small hamlet of Bebbanburg. Our adventurers then headed off into the Middle Mountains and entered negotiations with the dwarven outpost that resides there, getting on the tracks of whatever was driving the Gloomfang goblin tribe down into Middenland. The fifth chapter picks the story up from where chapter four left it (naturally!) and sees the group acquire a new task and a new friend. Of sorts...

If you've read this far and have no idea what this is all about, let me explain: I'm the GM of a game of 2nd Edition Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, in which my players play the characters listed above. I have taken it upon myself to write down our every single game session in a novel format, with full-blown dialogues, event descriptions and action sequences from our roleplaying sessions.

Welcome to the Mortenhoff Chronicles!

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapter Five

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapters One to Five

Enjoy!

PS. I've been thinking about posting a Who's Who in Mortenhoff? article in the near future, as our group has plenty of character art drawn that I could use to show you some of the most important NPCs and, of course, our PCs! What do you think?

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapters 1 to 4

Greetings!

Some while ago I managed to achieve an immensely rewarding and astonishing personal feat. The Mortenhoff Chronicles finally caught up with the events of my WHFRP campaign! Yes, that's right, I have now written each and every session of my group's roleplaying campaign into novel format, no more, no less!

This means that the pace at which the Chronicles will get updates here in the blog will slow down quite a lot; I need to wait for my group to play more sessions of WHFRP, I need to write those sessions into novel narration and I need to collect enough of these sessions to band them together to form a new chapter! So, those of you who have been following these Mortenhoff Chronicles updates, you will be needing a bit more patience from now on regarding these write-ups of mine.

I know you can manage, the duardin are famous for their cautious, painstaking pace at which all things in life are commenced.

In this chapter, Dracoh, Toga, Kalós, Nywon and Mellion find themselves in the Garden of Morr near the small hamlet of Bebbanburg, where their recent adventure has taken them to the source of the local undead menace. How will the group solve the necromantic dilemma? What can they do about the alleged charlatan doctor in the village? Can Mellion the Elf survive an encounter with the dwarves?

Here are the files for you, first Chapter 4 itself, and then the entire collection so far if you like reading your stories in their proper context (the collection includes many fixed typos all across the first three chapters):

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapter Four

Mortenhoff Chroncles: Chapters One to Four

Enjoy!

Old Skål Cometh

Greetings.

As a reader of my blog you might be a little confused at the sight of this post and that peculiar banner atop it. What is this "Old Skål" nonsense? Let me elaborate.

Before the year 2018 went out, I made a promise here at ExtraBushyBeards. I swore to bring existing campaigns to a closure, to start a bunch of new ones and to generally uphold all the things going on in the blog: shareable campaign systems, stories, narrative battle reports and pics of painted models. However, I also made a solemn promise on a wholly different matter... to start working on a project that would breathe the dark, grimy air of The World That Was. To start posting material on one of the old editions of Warhammer Fantasy Battles, a pedecessor of Age of Sigmar.

What this promise means is that I'm going to start collecting armies and rules for one of the older editions and to keep those models on square bases for that specific purpose. It also means you will be able to see WHFB-stuff on this page alongside all things Age of Sigmar.

No-one ever said these two game systems couldn't co-exist in a hobbyist's life.

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapters 1 to 3

Greetings!

Time has come, once again, to reveal a new chapter to the constantly developing novel-like narration of my Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay group's adventures! This time around the players begin the chapter with a two-day downtime, during which each of them saw to their own businesses alone or in temporary pairs.

As I cannot reveal any player character's full doings during those two days (my players are reading this), I decided to describe the player downtime through the eyes of three NPCs from the local populace; three regular villagers from Mortenhoff. I say this as a forewarning as you'd most likely have been rather confused suddenly seeing non-player names as chapter sub-headings!

Anyway, this chapter sees the players take on a new challenge: one of the local elder farmers has gone missing after releasing his farmhands once the harvest was done. The players set off to investigate, accompanied by their new acquaintance...

Be sure to check out Chapters One and Two for the group's previous adventures, especially if this is the first you hear of the Mortenhoff Chronicles. There's a reason I'm numbering the chapters and releasing them in portions, and it's that you really need the chronology to understand what's going on!




Here's the link to Chapter 3. It's the lengthiest chapter so far, so I will be releasing it as its own file. See the other link below this one if you want the entire collection so far, complete with various little fixes to typos and such.

---> Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapter Three <---

-> Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapters One to Three <-

Enjoy!

Map Campaign Lite

Greetings!

Too busy for campaigns but you'd really like to try out one of those map ones someday? You know, those that take forever to arrange and a century to play but you still keep dreaming? Now is your chance, and it won't even take that long!

I present you with Map Campaign Lite: a campaign system for those AoS players who would love some continuity in their games but would like to retain their freedom and make use of their limited hobby time. It is a conversion of an old campaign system found in the old Warhammer Fantasy Battles 6th Edition Rulebook. Enjoy!

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapters 1&2

Greetings!

It is time to release the second chapter of the Mortenhoff Chronicles, a novel-style record of my Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay group's adventures under my omnipotent GMing.

This chapter tells the story of the group's first actual quest, when they have already had a bit more time to get to know each other. Captain Schniller is sending them out to check on a remote inn at the edge of the Middle Mountains.

If you have already read Chapter 1, then you'll be familiar with the player characters by now. In case you haven't read it yet, here's a quick rundown of the group before you dive in:

- Dracoh Rigulah, Human Cadet
- Kalós Malákas, Human Pit Fighter
- Toga, Human Protagonist
- Nywon Nuntius, Human Scribe
- Mellion, Elven Apprentice Mage

This pdf-file also contains the first chapter for easy reference. Chapter 2 begins on page 23!

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapters one & two

Enjoy 🍺

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapter 1

Greetings!

Today you are witnessing something truly extraordinary and magnificent. In addition to the blog's usual narrative battlereports, campaign updates, painted models and the occasional short story, I'll start posting a longer story in chapters of around 15 to 30 pages a piece.

How is this so extraordinary? I have never posted anything written that was grander than my pseudo-philosophic hobby-ponderings, campaign (and one-off) short stories and battlereports. Today is the day I exceed myself by posting the first chapter of Mortenhoff Chronicles, a write-up of my Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay group's adventures in a campaign I'm currently GMing for them.

Your eyes are not deceiving you. I am actually writing the constantly evolving story of my players' exploits in the Warhammer RPG in a novel format; dialogues and all. It is a story of what has actually happened to the players in the game: a combination of my memory, my GM notes, the player notes and a tiny pinch of artistic freedom.

We are playing by the 2nd Edition rules, and most of the adventures so far have taken place within the Empire. The Imperial Year is 2522 and the Old World is just as you remember it from the time before the Storm of Chaos. I wanted my players (many of which were not familiar to the setting) to experience a more lively Warhammer world, so I cancelled the entire war. Yeah, I did. It's in my power, I'm the GM.

There are also some minor changes I've done to the world in order to fit it into my campaign, things like new towns and villages, fixes to population sizes and (non-canon) alternative fates and behaviour for some lords/ladies of the realm.

Chapter 1 begins with the introduction of the player characters as they meet each other for the first time. This is basically what happened in our first game session. Before the session, however, each of the players got to play a short introductory solo-mission that I had tailored to their unique backstories: missions that got them all in the same location for the first group session. I found this the best solution for introducing players to the basic mechanics of the game and the feel of the Warhammer world: each of them got to interact with the game world alone with the GM and to figure out the way they wanted to roleplay their characters. By having the chance to actually live through some of their own backstories, I feel the players were more confident in roleplaying and simulating their character's decision-making once we started the group sessions.

I have the Chapter 2 ready and waiting, and I'm currently working on the third. It will probably take up until the 4th Chapter for me to catch up with our group's current situation, but I'll get there eventually! In the meantime I'll be dropping these previous chapters for you folks to read through.

Mortenhoff Chronicles: Chapter One

The story itself is told through the viewpoints of the player characters, but as my players are also reading this (I'm actually writing this for them, you lucky dastards just get a glimpse at it on the side), I will not be revealing anything crucial about the PCs or their backstories in the Chronicles until something comes up in the game itself.

A HUGE thanks to my dear players for bringing life to the pile of .txt-files and notebooks that is my campaign! All the hours I spend preparing the material and coming up with crazy stuff would be for naught if it weren't for them turning it into a wonderful adventure with their dedicated roleplaying and intriguing characters. They were also kind enough to let me share their heroic deeds here in the blog!

The Ultimate Dice Cup

Greetings, and welcome to the hobby year 2019!

To kick this year off I will show you something I ordered last year and received just before the year changed...

An ExtraBushyBeards Dice Cup!

This beauty here is the handiwork of Anpilcraft, a truly skilled Russian craftsman who tailored this cup to my needs, based on my wishes of two colours and a single blurry screenshot of my blog's logo. It looks amazing, feels incredible and sounds like nothing short of wargaming ASMR when you rattle some dice in it.

It has a base structure of dyed leather with the beard logo embossed on its surface, all bound together with pure white thread. The inside is smooth, royal blue leather that muffles the rattling of dice to a pleasant level. It can hold a ton of 16mm D6s, and is sturdy enough to use as a means of transporting the dice!

Stunning work. Here's a picture of the very first roll I made with the cup: two 6s and five 5s. That's more than I usually roll during a 2000-point game! I say it is safe to deduce that this hand-made miracle has drawn the attention and appreciation of the Dice Gods.

I highly recommend checking out Anpilcraft's Instagram page for an entire gallery of his works and working methods. That man knows what he's doing.

Armed with this newly-acquired hobby tool, I expect great success in my upcoming battles and campaigns this year. The Dice Gods have had the tendency not to like me; let's hope this mighty totem will change my luck!

The Final March

The field was silent, except for the low hiss of the comets as they lay in their craters of wet soil. All around the site there were huge piles of ash where the corpses from the recent battle had been burned, those of friend and foe alike. Yet now there were no armies fighting over this blood-soaked swamp, no clashing swords, no echoing gunfire.

Two men were standing beside one of the comets, with no signs of other living beings anywhere to be seen. One of the men was walking down to the celestial orb, while the other stood on the edge of the crater, keeping watch.
"Will one comet be enough?" Gunmaster Wolfgang Fersen called down.
"How much power can the artefact bear?"
"I... believe one will suffice, as... the structure of the key doesn't seem to... be meant for enormous amounts of arcane energies," Battlemage Ernest Rosengart replied as he carefully descended into the crater.

Upon reaching the bottom, he placed the ornate key on top of the glowing half-buried comet. The surface of the celestial orb began glowing with golden light under the touch of the artefact. Ernest took his grimoire from his belt and began reciting a spell. Fersen scratched the back of his neck with his repeater, gazing around the swamps around them. This was the critical moment in which the wizard could not be disturbed.

Puffington Marshal Emmerich Heilman inspecting the Breuer's Regiment before they march off to war

Oldentown District Council Election

Who will you elect to sit on the District Council of Puffington Oldentown?

You are allowed to vote for several candidates at once and fill the form as many times as you like - we have an entire city district's worth of denizens to impersonate, after all!

The candidates have listed their goals and agendas in the Election Special of the Puffington Post newspaper. Study carefully before voting (or don't)!

This form remains open until 7.12.2018, exactly a week from now.

web polls

Warbands: Puffington Muffins & Puddings Militia

This warband belongs to VainVader, one of the partaking players in our Streets of Oldentown campaign. Check out his hobby blog diary to see what else he's up to. (But beware, the blog is written in Finnish – good luck reading that!)

Warbands: Usher's Unofficials

This warband belongs to Koltama, one of the partaking players in our Streets of Oldentown campaign. You're treading in his hobby stronghold right now.

Warbands: The Merry Muskrateers

This warband belongs to kuqry, one of the partaking players in our current Streets of Oldentown campaign. Check out more of his truly amazing work on his Instagram account!

Forewarned

"Make way! Make way!"
A group of half a dozen halberdiers was pushing through the soldiers of Wesley's company. Oswald's men were now sitting and over a handful of campfires around the recently captured altars, effectively blocking the way to the ruins. The irregulars among them spat curses at the gold-armoured cohort pushing through the throng.
"Make way for the wizard!"

Battlemage Ernest Rosengart and Gunmaster Wolfgang Fersen walked with the halberdiers towards the altar ahead. After receiving word of Captain Wesley's success, Rosengart and Fersen had travelled to the site with all haste, eager to purify and verify the authenticity of the key they were carrying. The press of bodies got even thicker near the ruins as they went.
"Of all the captains we sent out there with their companies to seek out altars in Hysh, it had to be Wesley to find it?" Wolfgang muttered as the halberdiers pushed aside yet another militiaman who refused to give way.
"That man's not exactly known for warm welcomes."
"I... am just as agitated by the fact as you, Wolfgang. But... I do have faith in Oswald's skills. Just... look at how few men he lost in the attack," Ernest pointed out, nodding at the mass of men they were pushing through.
"A fair point," Wolfgang replied, looking around him and making silent calculations.
"Only a dozen or so missing. And you said they were fighting... seraphon?"
"That... is what the runner told me. Oswald... is a cold and efficient man, Wolfgang. We... would do well to remember that," Ernest summed up as they arrived at the altar.

Crestfallen Return

Ernest Rosengart didn't know how long he'd been running. His mage's robes flapped and tangled about his weary feet as he went, constantly reminding that they were not designed for running away from danger. The ornate key he'd retrieved from the battlefield was still safely tucked away under his robes, but he had had to detach his spellbook from its beltchains in order to carry it under his arm. Hanging from the belt, the heavy tome had made running all but impossible.

Ernest crashed through yet another set of bushes and leafless boughs. He could hear his clothes tear, but he did not care. Not anymore. After climbing a small stony hillock, he finally caught a glimpse of Averbury heraldry.

"Fersen!" 

Bolt from the Blue

The windswept field had been silent for hours, except for the assiduous work of four freeguilders. No words had been spoken while a row of shallow graves emerged on the edge of the battlefield. The Bloodbound corpses had been left were they had fallen, but each and every Averbury man had been laid to rest in the shadow of the forest edge.

Placing the guardsman's helmet he'd used as a shovel on top of the final mound, Lieutenant Leopold Scholz let out a deep sigh.

"That's all I can do for you lads. I thank you for your honourable service. In Sigmar's name," he muttered, thumping his forearm against his chest in salute. The Greatswords behind him echoed the gesture. Gunmaster Fersen was standing a bit to the side of the scene, deep in thought. He too bowed his head in acknowledgement of the modest ceremony.

"We sweep the forest now, then?" the engineer eventually called out after a moment of silence.

"Aye. We'll see if anyone else has wandered here in search of us, then we'll move on to where the khornates came," Scholz replied.

"We'll find that artefact and carry on with the mission."

Hours passed. Fersen, Scholz and the two Greatswords walked through the forest back to the portal they'd come from, each on them on high alert for any lurking danger in these unfamiliar lands. Sun was shining high in the sky, illuminating the forest in a warm golden light that made the woods much more beautiful than its misty counterpart that came before. There were even some birds singing merrily in the canopy.

Bloodhunters, Skullgatherers or Gorefarmers?

Greetings!

This post is a special one. Some might still remember the What Can We Learn from the Duardin? -pondering I wrote some time ago, wondering about the mindset and world-view of the mountainfolk and thinking what we could learn from them. This is something very similar.

In this post I will take a close look at what the Khorne Bloodbound are and how their society might work outside the battlefield. They can't just be raging foam-mouthed maniacs all day and all night, now can they? The aim of this post is to speculate what the lives of these skull-hunting, blood-grazed barbarians might look like when there are no freeguilders around to behead.

This post does belong to my Ponderings-category, so read on at your own risk. You have been warned.

So what are the aspects of the Bloodbound society we're going to scrutinise here? Well, here's my checklist:

- Subsistence Strategy
- Habitation Model
- Population
- Social Structure
- Worldview

We'll go through the list one topic at a time, slowly establishing a wholesome bigger picture of who these servants of the War God truly are. To support my deductions and speculations I use the models and background information provided by Games Workshop.

The Searching Party

"Scholz? Scholz, you still there?"
Leopold tried to open his eyes, but even the faint light that flooded in was enough to make his head feel like splitting. His breaths were laboured and slow. It felt like something was sitting on his chest.
"Sigmar's balls! You took quite the beating there... Not much left of your fancy breastplate now. Now where did I put my knife..."

Leopold recognized that voice. Wolfgang Fersen. The Gunmaster. He wanted to reply to the man, to ask him where the bloody hell he'd been, but instead he focused on keeping his breathing shallow. That way it didn't hurt so bloody much. There was the sound of ripping fabric, a few shlinks and chops of a knife slicing things, and the weight on the lieutenant's chest lifted.

He sprang upright to a sitting position, drawing his lungs full of fresh air time and again with hungry gasps. He wolfed down the air like he was sitting at some noble's banquet after having subsided barely on army rations for months. How was it possible that air tasted this good? Leopold cast a quick gaze around his immediate surroundings, seeing the crouched Gunmaster in front of him holding the badly battered front piece of his breastplate. The leather straps of the piece of armour had been neatly cut.
"You look like shit, Scholz."
"Same to you, Gunmaster."

There were shapes of men walking about in the fog all around them, some of them strolling as if on watch, others digging up the soft soil with their hands and helmets. They were clad in the colours of the Puffington Empire. Averbury men, here in the mysterious woods? What was going on?
"Care to explain these chaps strolling about?" he asked Wolfgang while carefully trying to feel the condition of his broken nose with his hands. It was a bloody mess.
"Not much to explain there. Searching parties were sent out after us when we didn't return to the encampment, and these brave men here found the curious mist through which to travel here. They found me running away from that monstrous orruk and drove it off, so we could get back here to find you and bury the dead."