Fall of Helmawr - Campaign Finale
The Setup
The campaign wrapped up on April 9 with a big multiplayer game, The Hive Secundus Roadblock.
The story going in: House Aranthus has set up an armed checkpoint across one of the few roads through the Ash Wastes to Hive Secundus, and the Imperial House has put together a convoy to smuggle Lady Haera through. She's hidden inside one of the Imperial vehicles, and only the Imperial players know which one.
The Imperial House wins if Lady Haera makes it to the far edge of the board (on foot or in a vehicle). If she doesn't, House Aranthus wins. Aranthus and Unaligned fighters can search an Imperial vehicle by getting next to it and passing an Intelligence check. If she's inside, she jumps out and attacks with her power spear, and if she's taken out of action she becomes a loot casket that anyone can pick up and carry.
Eleven of us played: four gangs on the Imperial House side running the convoy, five on House Aranthus manning the checkpoint, and two Unaligned. The Drongos have backed Aranthus for multiple campaigns now, so took up position on the right of the checkpoint. With that many players on one table, I think everyone ended up bringing two fighters and a vehicle. Dakk came in with the Servo harness from the deal with the Escher player after Week 5.
To keep that many models moving we used the Warfare rules: no pinning, no injury dice, no bottle tests, and any fighter reduced to 0 wounds is just removed. Visibility was set to 9".
The Game
Dakk was a beast. Any time he had visibility on a target, the heavy bolter deleted it (sorry, Minbo's Van Saar). The Imperial Van Saar were down two pretty early, which left them with one guy on a hoverboard, and they played him very conservatively from then on, using the visibility rules to keep him out of sight.
The convoy definitely got the worst of the shooting early on, at least until their heavy vehicles got in range.
There was some desperate smoke grenade action to stop a charge, which ended up being a big deal.
And, as is traditional in big group games, there was a huge multi-vehicle collision in the middle of the board.
I don't think we were smart enough to attempt to search the vehicles, instead flushing her out of hiding by pumping them full of lead. By late in the game Lady Haera was out of hiding and in the middle of the road with everyone else. She was taken out of action, which turned her into a loot casket for someone to grab.
The Unaligned gangs hung back for most of the game, then advanced right at the end and laid waste to the survivors. The Spyrers were out for blood after keeping us on edge for the first three quarters of the game and the genestealer cult ended up being the decisive faction.
It all came down to one window. With no vehicles left running, the Van Saar hoverboard could come in, pick up Lady Haera and get back out of shooting range, and sprint off the table. It came down to one priority roll to see if they could get in and out before the heavy bolter had time to react.
The fates (and GW writers) were not on Lady Haera's side and they lost the roll. The final action of the game was Dakk, mind-controlled by the genestealers into taking a Shoot action. He took out the hoverboard Van Saar, and Lady Haera wasn't going anywhere.
House Aranthus took the win, and we got the canon ending with Lady Haera staying captured, and Aranthus ascendant.
How It Played
It was a nail-biter in the end. Eleven players and all those vehicles, and the whole campaign came down to the priority order in the last round and one heavy bolter shot.
Post-Game
We didn't run a post-game for the Finale, so there's no income, XP or injuries to report. The Drongos finish the campaign on 15 reputation with a Gang Rating of 2330.
Campaign Wrap
That's a wrap on Fall of Helmawr. The Drongos played four games and won all four, and the only fighter we lost along the way was Kudgo back in Week 1.
