Age of Warlords - WAB Arthurian Campaign Introduction

Brude MacBrude, mighty Bretwalda, king of all Britannia, heaved himself upright, cursing inwardly as the entirety of his kingly hall spun wildly. Forcing back the instinct to vacate his churning guts, the huge Pict warlord flung back the fur coverlet on the royal bed and lurched unsteadily towards the door. 

On the other side of the bed, the young Briton serving girl lay unmoving... Brude shook his head...he couldn't even remember taking the girl to his bed...By all the gods, those Saxons could drink!! He had always been a drinker, able to drink all-comers under the table and into sweet oblivion, but those Saxon kings...they had taxed him to the limit. Still, Brude wagered that they were in a far worse state than he this fine spring morning... Hair of the hound, that was what was needed... 

"WINE!!!!" he roared, wincing at the explosion of agony behind his eyes as his mighty voice echoed across the hall. 
"Wine..." he repeated again, finally reaching the door and, hurling it open, he breathed several deep lungfulls of clear spring air. It was chill, refreshing. Just what was needed.

Standing framed by the doorway into his royal hall which was situated on a hillock in the centre of the sprawling Pictish Broch, Brude reflected on the events of the previous three days.

Those four Saxon and Anglian kings came to him without fear, he had noted. But then, they were new come to Britannia, having fought their way into the lands of the coward Britons who had fought him in the Great Wars from five years before. These Saxon and Anglian kings had not yet seen the fierceness of the Pictish sword, the flight of Pictish javelins, the arrows from concealment that had destroyed warband after warband in the Great Wars... Great days indeed. 

Yet now, more petulant Britons and their puny Saxon allies were threatening his rule, rebelling against him, Brude MacBrude the Bretwalda. Well, that was fine...let them rebel! His spies had told him all he needed to know and, over much fine Briton beef, Briton Wine ('tribute' from his subjugated neighbours, of course) and fine Saxon ale, alliances with the newcomers had been made and signed in blood. These newcomers would fight by his side and the rebellion would fail. It would fail anyway, he thought, but better that our fine Germanic allies should perish in its demise than fine upstanding Pict warriors.

So it was done...

On the next new moon, the alliance would strike, crossing the river borders into the rebellious kingdoms for combat, pillage, loot and slaughter. A new Age of Warlords was begun and Brude MacBrude, mighty Bretwalda of Britannia would prove once again that he was master of this land and its pathetic people...

On Monday, we start our WAB campaign, Age of Warlords, set in 500AD in Britain. It uses army lists based on those in Age of Arthur, but uses 1000pt army lists with various modifications to allow smaller unit and more characters. If anyone is interested in the army lists, rule changes and scenarios, do let me know by replying to this thread with an email address and I'll then link you to a Dropbox folder with all the stuff in. I won't publish your email address on the comments section, so if you want to leave any other comments please do so separately so that I can publish those.

Look out for more posts as the campaign progresses....

Here's a few pics from a practice game I had with gaming buddy Mike W on Monday. We were playing the Battle of Mt Agned and were trying to gain control of the aforementioned Mt Agned while denying the other war band access to the hill.

Mike's dice failed him spectacularly in this game, but they finally came good on the very last turn enabling him to turn a mighty defeat into a close-run one. Basically, when pretty much my entire army (well, apart from the archers and one unit of combrogi that Mike had seen off) was camped on the hill, Mike launched his sole remaining unit (a unit of Duguth) against my Teulu in a suicidal charge to try to contest the hill. He lost the fight and needed to roll 4 on 2 x D6 to stay in the fight. Which he promptly failed to do, but on remembering that the character in his unit was the ASB, he re-rolled and got...A 4!!!!! Brilliant end to the game!! See Mike's blog for his take on events.