Mordheim 2019: Undead games

Church of the Ever Burning Saint attempt to banish a vampire twisted and warped by wyrdstone.

My brothers and I played a multitude of games of Mordheim during the Mordheim 2019 event, all of them unique and filled with surprises. With this post, I wanted to describe the two games played with my undead warband, the first against Nicky Grillet‘s Sisters of Sigmar and Alexander Lunde’s Witch Hunters, and the second against Erik Blomqvist’s Sisters of Sigmar.

Game 1:

My first game was played on a modular sewer board against Nicky Grillet’s Sisters of Sigmar and Alexander Lunde’s Witch Hunters.

The undead enter a series of rusting boiler rooms and start to wander the halls, looking for warm bodies to rend apart.

The Church of the Ever Burning Saint find themselves in a cavernous vault of damp rock walls, knowing to their core that wyrdstone infested the underground passages.

The Witch Hunters can taste the corruption of magic in the close, stagnant air and venture forth into the dark corridors with sword and stake in hand.

One of the tunnels opens up into a frigid space dominated by a quivering mass of fleshy tissue of uncertain origin. The undead drift past without apparent interest.

The spectral apparitions take notice of the Witch Hunters stumbling through the sewers and sprint into combat.

Simultaneously, the Witch Hunters’ hounds catch the scent of the Sisters of Sigmar and bound through the dark to make contact, baring tooth and claw.

While their attention is held by the attacking Witch Hunters, the deranged Vampire Count assaults the Sisters of Sigmar in the flank.

A valiant Sister stands alone to hold back the tide of wyrdstone-poisoned apparitions, but is quickly overwhelmed.

Another wraith shifts into combat with a novice Sister of the Order, but her resolve in Sigmar’s grace is strong and she banishes the spirit with a consecrated hammer.

Some of the Witch Hunters start to fall to the incorporeal blows of the wraiths, before their Captain Gottorm pushes the rest forward with rage and holy conviction.

Matriarch Alke and her Sister Superiors turn to face the fractured and demented vampire, gritting their teeth with determination as their features are lit by the flickering glow of their burning saint.

The remaining Sisters of Sigmar bring their hammers to bare against the Witch Hunters, chanting oaths of benediction, causing them to route and flee the sewers. As they turn to assist their matriarch against the ghostly undead, the apparitions vanish as silently and mysteriously as they appeared, leaving the Sisters of Sigmar alone in darkness.

Game 2:

The second game was played on a remarkable collapsible board Nicky Grillet created inside a small travel chest. My undead faced off against Erik Blomqvist’s Sisters of Sigmar.

The two warbands find themselves in an old rotting section of Mordheim, with glowing caches of wyrdstone deep within the tangled ruin.

Through crumbling masonry the undead stalk.

A fallen vampire pauses in ruined hovel, its thoughts unknowable, if it has them at all.

A congregation of Sisters of Sigmar search the surrounding ruins for wyrdstone, filling the narrow streets.

The wretched dregs of humanity and mutated abhumans stumble and skitter through along rotted planks, drawn to the unhallowed glow of wyrdstone.

The hunched and broken vampire, flanked by flickering wraiths, finds a few shards of luminous wyrdstone.

A coterie of Sisters charges the blood-caked vampire, prayers to Sigmar on their lips, but are unable to hurt the deranged being.

On the creaking walkways far below, the other Sisters engage with the blighted creatures and strange anomalies, but find they are unable to cause them harm.

Having lost four of their Sisters to the spectral touch of the undead wraiths, the Sisters of Sigmar decide to pull back with their wounded and regroup for a future assault.

It is hard to put into words how wonderful it was to meet up with so many hobbyists that I have been admiring their work for years, and play some games of Mordheim. Each game was fantastic due to all the great models and terrain, but more importantly the people involved. It is sad to think that the event is now over, but I am excited to see what everyone does next and get involved in any way I can!

- Eric Wier