Smoke was rising over the dawn horizon as the tired sentry swigged the last of the water in his canteen. Squinting over iron sights, he peered down into the valley below and was suddenly snapped back to wakefulness.
The horde below seemed to have multiplied during the night. The Orca warhorde they had been tracking was far larger than intelligence had led them to believe – their brute warchiefs bellowed orders in their foul tongue, and although much of the camp was wreathed in smoke, the vibrations through the ground betrayed the steps of some far larger creature.
Could it really be true? The machinations of this new warchief that had been terrorising the northern quadrant had all been to summon some abomination from beyond the veil? The possibility was to hideous to contemplate, yet in the face of such terror, the Sky Marines stood tall…
The bushes rustled behind him. The next watch was arriving. He turned and hissed the password “Thunder?”
No answer.
“Thunder?” he hissed, irritated.
With inhuman swiftness, the chittering shadow leapt upon him, it’s blade cleaving a bloody arc through the man’s battledress.
“Die-die, man thing!” hissed the Ratman, wiping the Sky Marines’ blood on its’ cloak…
Well, it’s been a long time coming but we’ve finally managed to bring the Hyperian Warsmini-sort-of-campaign to a conclusion! And now the Orca horde of Warchief Ghazhrag The Bloody have established their status as Senior Baddies by beating seven shades out of Lord Ratticus’ Virum Nascii, we figured a suitable climax would be having them team up against the combined forces of humanity, the Ancien Regime and the Grand Alliance 301st Skyborne! And in doing so, we figured we could shake down the Hyperian Wars ruleset by seeing how it coped with a battle fo this scale and complexity…
Grab a beer, this is going to be a good one 😉
The stage is set… Baddies to the left, Goodies to the right – humanity’s Thin Red Line
Phew. Well, we did it – just. Humanity held this day, despite appalling casualties and some real nailbiter moments! In fairness to Dan, this was a “beta test” style game, working out some kinks and it’s easy to see that once we’ve got the Orca magick system a bit more fleshed out the shamans will be a LOT more effective.. plus we had to bodge the initiative system a bit to account for the different Strategy Ratings of the four sides.. but overall, immense fun was had, and the system got shaken down very thoroughly! The Beasts of Hyperia will be back, you’ll see…
Warchief Ghazrag surveyed the seen and grunted. His Waaagh God Avatar had been banished back to the ether, most of his ladz and practically all the Ratmen were slaughtered – it was time to pull back while he still had enough troops to rebuild.
He shrugged. It had been a laugh, after all. And you could always come back for anuvver go. “See you soon, ‘oomie”, he grunted and gestured for his lads to follow him from the battlefield…
Cast your eye over these holiest of places. This, this, is where Humankind came to Hyperia so many centuries ago, fleeing the dying world and the ceaseless war. Here our prophet planted his flag and said “Today mankind stands reborn!”.
Many are those who have left to seek fortune elsewhere, to explore and conquer this world. Humanity - or those close enough to fit the genus – raises it’s flag on every island and continent on Hyperia. But here is where it all began. Here, on this, hallowed ground. Here the Ancien Regime was born, and in the unnumbered millienia of our history, here is where we have weathered every storm, beaten back every would-be destroyer, built our world anew. This is humanity’s rock on which all others will dash themselves.
Here we are with the fourth and (so far final) instalment of our Hyperian Wars escalation project, focusing on the Napoleonic-meets-Tolkien-meets-The Empire from Warhammer faction of humanity – the Ancien Regime! This massive, continent-spanning empire represents the numerically and geographically greatest of the various human societies, and its kings and nobles all claim (with varying degrees of legitimacy) to trace their lineage back to the First Leader who brought humanity from it’s dying home to escape a war they believed would consume humanity and end the world (wonder what he could be referring to…) – but they have also stagnated technologically and regressed into mysticism and Vril-worship to keep their creaking empire rolling.
These guys are actually seasoned veterans, having been featured in the blog when it was nought but a bairn, and came as a part of a massive 2012 Ebay haul… and it was while we wondering what the bloody hell to do with a bunch of Napoleonics and WW1 Brits that the concept of Apocalypse: Earth having a fantasy/steampunk/ VSF cousin, and featured in the very first test game back in 2016… and in that game, you may notice the Mk. 1 Dauntless – rather less refined than it’s successor – and a superheavy steam tank called the Ironclad.
Which having got 90% ready, then sat unfinished until September 2023. Of course. And it was during The Summer Of Tidying that we decided to get the Ancien Regime faction properly finished and tarted up. The Ironclad (which began life as a papercraft from Landships II, the Holt Steam Wheel Tank in 1/48 so suitably imposing for 1/72) got a new paint job (matching the repainted A7V Steam Tank) and because it looked pretty undergunned as was, I strapped a massive howitzer onto the back made from a defunct pen to ensure the lads had some sort of parity with the horrors that Hyperia has to offer.
So, pics:
And so right now, the Ancien Regime stands (reluctantly) shoulder to shoulder with the Skyborne 301st in facing down the beasts of the Virum Nascii and the Orca in the shed as our slow burning Hyperian Wars campaign comes to a climax! So that’s what you can look forward to in the next few weeks 😉
Meantime, stay safe, thrifty and Slavia Ukrainia – we’ll see you soon
If you’ve been a regular subscriber to this blog, you’ve probably seen the on-again, off-again Hyperian Wars sort-of-campaign featuring Warchief Ghazhrag The Bloody’s attempts to acquire all manner of mysteriously sacred stones, and I’m sure the question that’s been uppermost in everyone’s minds is “just what does he want them for?”
I mean, it’s not like there’s anything else to be worrying about right now, is there?
Well, the time has come to reveal the terrifying truth… the Orca have summoned their War God! And here he is!
Yep, that’s the Hulk. Actually, I’ve kind of got Midwinter Minis to thank for this idea – Guy’s repurposing of his Hulk model made me realise that big, green and ANGRY = Orc/ Ork/ Orca, and so I acquired a Hulk of my own off eBay, a little converting (helmet, club), primed and based and here we are!
For the second part of the project, I took inspiration from an ooooooooooooold White Dwarf WHFB report which featured an Orc Shaman on a War Wyvern… so I started with a T-Rex toy I picked up for a quid from a local charity shop.
Next, wings – these were cocktail sticks snapped in two and the joints sealed with superglue, and then I cut some wings out of paper and superglued them in place. Then, to make them more organic looking, I rolled a cylinder of greenstuff and smeared/ applied it to the structure.
Next up, priming – grey, dusted with white, and a thinned wash of Vallejo Smokey Ink, before painting. I started with a yellow base and then gradually layered up green with Army Painter Goblin Green and Green Tone ink washes. The cream parts were a craft bone washed with Vallejo flesh wash and then more bone stippled and drybrushed over the top, and I used the bone to pick out the teeth and claws before doing the eyes in red. Then out to the shed for basing and varnish, and that’s that done!
So, pics of Whaaagh-Ghazhrag in full:
Pretty impressive horde, eh? Those Skyborne won’t know what hit them! Stay tuned for our upcoming HW mega smackdown, and stay thrifty out there!
In this great coalition of nations, there are those amongst our populace who rail against the use of force, who would offer the hand of friendship to monstrosities such as the Orca or the Dead.. those who would see us lie down naked and supplicant in the face of the Virum Nascii. To those in our parliaments and cabinets who question the need for the forces we maintain, I would ask them to look a charging Orca in it’s hate-filled red eye and convince it of the justice of our cause. I would ask them how we should use “soft power” and “social justice programs” to defend against a murderous tide of Ratmen bent on destruction, death and enslavement. I would ask by what means of deterrence would we keep the Cousin Races of the Ee’la and Stoc’d from turning upon us. How we might keep in check the dogmatic religious zealots of the Ancien Regime kingdoms from upending our cherished democracies.
I would remind these people, as they sit in safety and comfort, pondering abstract matters of state.. I would remind them that they have that privilege only so long as rough men stand ready to deliver violence on their behalf. I would remind them that such privilege is bought solely with the blood and bravery of the Skyborne!
Back to our steampunk/fantasy world of Hyperia, and here we are looking at the newly reinforced detachment of the Grand Alliance faction – a loose coalition of floating cities and islands spread across the western hemisphere of Hyperia, bound together by mercantilist tradition and by far the most technologically advanced of the human factions, even if the more esoteric elements of Vril lie beyond their grasp.
Not bound to the rank & file regiment system of all the other powers, the Skyborne Infantry are all able to operate as skirmishers and with hefty firepower are able to punch well above their weight numerically, particularly given their “Mad Minute” special training, although when enemies can get in close in numbers, things get sticky quickly…
Not to give too much away, but there’s probably going to be an uptick in Hyperian Wars content over the next few weeks as the slow burn “campaign” comes to a head… Stay thrifty out there and see you soon!
We live in an increasingly turbulent world. Our cousin races – the Ee’la, the Stoc’d – withdraw into themselves, thinking only of their own interests. The Beasts – Orca, Grub, Virum Nascii, Lacerats – their numbers grow by the day, encroaching onto those territories claimed by Man. The Dead pour from the dark places.. and even while all this takes place, still we turn on each other.
Our Sky Marines perform above and beyond the call of duty but in the face of peer and near-peer competitors it is vital that we shore up our technologicalto maintain overmatch in the face of these perils. And so we are proud to unveil a new generation of Skycutters to ensure that our forces go into battle equipped the very best in firepower and protection from perils both physical and enchanted. To this end, we present our latest and best battlefield weapon – the Allied Sky Vessel “Dauntless”
Yep, I got into the recycling again…
Actually, I’ve been meaning to do this for AGES. Ever since I saw this:
So there we go – I’m really, really chuffed with this build, it came together really well and I think it looks the part too… full of menace, hovering across the battlefield dispensing Vrilfire death to the enemies of the Grand Alliance… let’s see what those filthy Greenskin savages, rat abominations or misguided religious zealots can come up with to match her!
Stay thrifty out there and see you soon – we’ve just noticed that it is (drumroll please) Orctober!!! So no prizes for guessing the next few posts themes…
As tensions across the world of Hyperiaescalate, the Grand Alliance coalition of willing floating cities and aero-states are finding it necessary to deploy Sky Marine task forces with increasing regularity. As by necessity these task forces are small in terms of numbers, despite their high quality training and equipment they arevulnerable to near-peer competitors able to deploy overwhelming numbers. To this end, the Alliance military-industrial complexhave been tasked with developing easily deployable “force multipliers”. The Fawcett-Fairchild “Whippet” class Quadrupedal Ambulatory Weapons Platform is such a device, crewed by a single Sky Marine, Vril-enabled Artificial Cognisance enabling it to track multiple targets, prioritise them and engage with twin belt-fed 1-inch canons – all the while networking with “senior” constructs such as the Dauntless-class Skycutter.”
You know that feeling when you see a piece of junk that you’re about to throw out and all of a sudden a voice in your head says “Keep me… I am destined to be more than this..”…
Yes, it’s a junk build. Missed these, haven’t you? 😉
So it was with a simple plastic cap off a bottle of guitar string cleaner – there was just something about the proportions that I thought looked right in 1/72… coupled with the fact that Dan had mentioned a new RTS called Iron Harvest that he reckoned I might get a kick out of…
Next up, the cannons – two more cocktail sticks with sort of grippy bits on them (look at the pic, I don’t know how best to describe them!) – these got the superglue/ PVA treatment straight to the body. This works really well – PVA gives a flexible, sturdy bond but it takes time to dry, whereas superglue is quick drying but brittle. Mixing them seems to do wonders, and there doesn’t seem to be any side effects like Mel The Terrain Tutor describes from mixing superglue and hot glue.
The ammo belts you see feeding the cannons are cut from IDE cable (credit to Zrunelord from TMP there), chopped about 5mm by 10mm and given the magic glue mix, and the shiny thing on top is a defunct watch battery – gives the thing a nice bit of weight.
On the top you can see a chopped down superglue cap, and a couple of thin pieces of card glued to the front for armour plating, and just out of shot are a couple of drinking straws trimmed to represent exhausts:
And once again, I forgot to take pics of the painting process, so here we are with some finished beauty shots:
Stay thrifty out there, and if you’re so inclined you can now follow us on Instagram! Just search “@skinflintgames” – see you in the next one
Yes, I’m still avoiding the Marines… but bear with me, I’m almost at the finish line with this project – and when the end is in sight, it seems perverse to switch focus to something else.
So having finished up the “Orcs Of Colour”, that left me with just a single regiment of 30 Orca Warriors left to do.. then there are the shamans, of course, plus I reckon I could probably knock together a couple of stone throwers.. and I have an idea for a “superheavy”…
Anyway, point is, I can see an end to this project, so I took a deep breath and dove straight into the final regiment. Based on 20mm squares of wine box cardboard, white primer, prewash with thinned down black ink – it’s a poor man’s zenithal primer, plus it helps my Mr Magoo eyes pick out what detail is what.. in addition to covering up any gaps that might otherwise be left a glaring white.
Other than that it’s the usual scheme – Army Painter Goblin Green skin washed with Army Painter Green Tone, red bits are Vallejo Hot Orange washed with Red Ink with a unifying drybrush of yellow… The metallics are Vallejo Mithril Silver washed with Smokey Ink for a rusty effect as Orcs of any universe are not known for their weapons maintenance.
So, pics:
Regular readers will have noticed the progress of Warchief Ghazrag The Bloody across the world of Hyperia in pursuit of capturing some holy stones…
So far they’ve battered both Ratticus McStilton III’s Virum Nascii and the Sky Marines of the Grand Alliance, so next up will be a face off against the Ancien Regime now the gaming shed is back in business… Can we make it three in a row? Let’s see!
It’s the summertime and the weather is fine, and I’ve been out in the garden knocking back wine…
Time to step away from the Blood Angels for a bit – I’ve lost confidence in my eye for detail (nothing to do with ay criticism, by the way – all the comments I’ve had have been positive, in fact far more positive than I deserve), and I think I need to do a fair bit of freehand practice to get my skills up to snuff before having another go at my command figures. So it makes sense to go to a smaller scale, right?
Well… yeah, actually. See, the issue I had with the BAs was with the smooth surfaces and details like the campaign badges and banners (which also highlighted the downsides to painting with housepaints rather than model paints in some instances… X-D) . The details that are picked out for you on the sculpts – pipes, aquilas etc – I wasn’t too bad with. And with my Orcs, there’s plenty of those. This lets washes and drybrushing take care of the heavy lifting – plus any mistakes you can hide within a regiment of 30, right?
So here we are – a regiment of 30 Black Orcs (Orcs of Colour?):
But to no avail, as the Orcs crash into them from both sides!
And so Gazhrag The Bloody scored another victory, albeit having lost half his archers, his elite Black Orcs and a regiment of regular Orcs in the process… and we ironed out a few more kinks in the Hyperian Wars ruleset, hopefully bringing the publication date to three days before the heat death of the universe.
Stay thrifty out there – Jim’s got something he’s really excited to tell you all about… 😉
It’s customary in many a fantasy trope to regard humanity as besieged on all sides by innumerable hordes of vile creatures, united as one in their desire for destruction – but on the world of Hyperia, this ain’t necessarily so! As it turns out, be they human, elf, dwarf, or Baddie (TM) – pretty much everyone hates everyone else in roughly equal measure.
As some of you may be aware, we did a fair few HW games in 2019 and the ratmen kicked some ass and took some names… but then The Great Plague struck and gaming (and thus rule development) all went down the pan. Now, mercifully, we’ve just got potential WW3 to worry about, and until someone invents a facemask that can stop a Satan II ICBM warhead… well, we might as well stop worrying, crack open a bottle and play soldiers.
Dan brought everything he’d got finished, including a commander I hadn’t seen before (!), and because our Virum Nascii horde vastly outnumbers… everything, really, I decided to stick to the basics – warriors, slaves, archers, Plague Priests, Stormtroopers and Warlord. All the special weapons stuff would stay home for now. This was a rough estimate in points values, but also so I could beat him without fear of emotional blackmail – the Orca are tough – thick, but tough – and hit hard in big blocks but have little missile weaponry and no magic (yet).
Rules, for those interested:
Orcs:
Orc Warrior:
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
12
6
4
2
9
2
Regular
Default: Advance (Assault)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
1
Melee
8+D6
1
Orc Archer
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
12
5
3
2
9
2
Regular
Default: Advance (Assault)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Bow
1
60cm
7+D6
1
Savage Orc
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
12
6
4
2
8
2
Elite
Default: Advance (Assault)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
1
Melee
8+D6
1
Orc General
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
12
5
6
3
12
4
Elite
Default: Advance (Assault)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
1
Melee
8+D6
2
Orc Shaman
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
12
5
5
3
10
3
Elite
Default: Advance (Assault)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
1
Melee
8+D6
2
Filth (4+): Target friendly unit within 12” gets Poison in melee next time it fights.
Cracks (4+): Target enemy unit within 12” takes 2 automatic hits with AP(2).
Sickness (5+): Target enemy unit within 18” gets -1 to hit next time it shoots.
Lightning (5+): Target enemy unit within 12” takes 1 hit with AP(4) and Deadly(3).
Frenzy (6+): Target friendly unit within 12” may immediately move by up to 6”.
Pestilence (6+): Target enemy unit within 6” takes 1 automatic hit per model.
Virum Nascii
Warrior
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
18
6
3
3
6
1
Poor
Default – Hold
Slaves
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
18
7
2
3
6
1
Untrained
Default – Panic
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Bow
1
50cm
6+D6
1
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
1
Melee
6+D6
1
Poison Grenadiers
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
18
6
3
3
6
1
Regular
Default: Advance (ranged)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Poison Grenade
1
12+D6
8+D6
3 (Blast 3cm)
Stormtroopers
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
18
6
4
3
6
1
Regular
Default: Advance (Assault)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
1
Melee
8+D6
1
Assassins
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
20
6
3
4
6
1
Regular
Default: Advance (Assault)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
1
Melee
8+D6
1
Warlord
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
18
5
4
4
9
2
Veteran
Hero
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
3
Melee
7+D6
1
Plague Priests
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
18
6
3
3
7
1
Regular
Default: Advance (Assault)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Hand Weapons
1
Melee
7+D6
2
Weapons Teams
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
18
5
3
4
7
1
Regular
Independent, Default: Hold (Ranged)
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Vrilrifle
1
48cm
20+2D6
2
Ratling Gun
6
36cm
7+D6
1
Vrilfire Thrower
1
Template
12+D6
2
Vrilgrinder Drill
N/A
N/A
N/A
Sets up Ambush*
*Ambush – This unit begins in reserve. When it is placed, it may pop up anywhere more than 18cm from an enemy unit. Any friendly Virum Nascii units not already deployed may follow through the tunnel and pop and deploy with a unit facing touching the tunnel mouth in the case of a regiment or in the case of an individual character.
Master Of Engineers:
Speed
Shooting Skill
CCR
Initiative
Armour
Hit Point
Morale
Notes
18
4
3
4
9
2
Veteran
Hero
Weapon
Rate Of Fire
Close Range
Penetration
Damage
Vrilfire Pistol
3
24cm
12+D6
2
Dan brought the Orca general, two regiments of 30 Warriors each, a regiment of 25 Savage Orcs and 16 Archers – I brought the Virum Nascii Warlord, a regiment of 32 Slave archers, 2 regiments of 16 warriors each, 28 Slaves, 6 Stormtroopers and 16 Plague Priests.
We decided on a specific objective – controlling the sacred stones within a ruined temple. To win, a player would have to have an unshaken (unsuppressed) unit within half a move distance, so 9cm for the VN, 6cm for the slower Orcs. To war!
Ratmen warriors ambush a unit of Orca warriors in the rear, causing them to rout!
The slaves rally…
With just the 6 Stormtroopers and 20 odd largely ineffectual Slave archers against 16 much more effective Orca archers and a block of 20 Warriors, as well as Ghazrag himself, the surviving Virum Nascii realised they had no chance to take the objective and conceded the game. Victory to the Orca!
Although this was by no means a strictly competitive game – we were tweaking the rules on the fly and working out mechanics as we went – it was still really fun and pretty cinematic watching two VERY different flavours of Baddie go against each other! There are still more Orca to come and lots of special units for the Ratmen too so expect another faceoff in the near future… and of course what happens when these meet the Sky Marines of the Grand Alliance or the massed ranks of the Ancien Regime?
Stay tuned for more fantasy wackiness as we get into summer, and who knows, we may even get these rules out and published before the heat death of the universe…..
(NB – If you’re new here, go check out Parts 1 & Part 2, because otherwise NONE of this is going to make any sense…)
As we left matters at the end of turn 2, the central valley was awash with (now largely dead) Ratmen, but the objective – the crashed spaceship – was now in the hands of a regiment of humble Virum Nascii slaves and heading towards the Baddies’ table edge, and to make things worse the sorcerous cabal of the People’s Front Of Hazzard 237th Freedom Brigade had managed to conjure up a wall of psychic fire across the main approach route!
On the Goodies’ side, the PSLA (or Imperial Guard, depending on your viewpoint) finally showed up, adding a decent chunk of firepower, but as things stood, firepower was not the issue, we had plenty of that – getting it where it was needed was the problem!
Over on the Baddies’ table edge, Dan cackled malevolently as the Holy Soviet Army’s BIG GUNS appeared, in the form of Stompy Uncle Joe and the IS-6 Rampager (which would prove itself almost offensively useless, but there we go) and another regiment of Orcs arrived, but two more still languished on the sidelines – clearly too thick to find the batlefield.. and off we went for the next turn!
Turn 3 –
So there you have it, a very smart Hail Mary play with a little luck on his side and my opponent snares victory! In fairness, had Dan not had the luck he would have won the next turn anyway, there was no way I was going to be able to get enough firepower into position to stop his troops running off with the objective. He damn near won at the start of turn 3 anyway, as the Virum Nascii Vrilseers created a reality tunnel for the Slaves to jump in to – had I not got lucky with it scattering, and not managed to suppress them, he would have had it in the bag right then.
Thoughts? Well, I think I did my usual trick of playing it like a straight up battle where the objective was to destroy the opponent – Dan on the other hand actually played the scenario… which was even more galling because I wrote the scenario!!! Reviewing the battle, he played very cleverly, and with all the ruthlessness that befits a Baddie general – the sacrifice of the Virum Nascii “rat bombing” me on Turn 2 and using the tough-as-nails Skooderia units to stymie me in the centre, then blocking the valley choke point with a psychic fire barrier… well played, sir, well played!
Right, after that MAMMOTH battle report I shall be handing the keys over to my colleague and going and lying on the sofa with a wet flannel over my head and quite possibly a large gin on standby…
Stay safe, healthy and thrifty out there wherever you may be in hobbyland, we’ll see you very soon!