rioja

Of course, it hasn't all been cocking about with toy soldiers. Although it has mostly been cocking about with toy soldiers.

There was also some cocking about with the track slag, which at the last check had a few issues with brakes. The scale of the problem became apparent when we removed the old pads.

For the uninitiated, the shiny bits show where the pad itself has worn away completely and the metal backing plate - which provides almost no stopping power but is very good at ruining brake discs - has ground itself away on the brake disc. As might be expected, the discs themselves were also a bit of a state.

I sure pity the sucker that had to drive that home from the track. (thanks Laura...)

So, new pads and discs all round. We decided after the last jolly that uprating the brakes was probably a smart idea anyway, and so after a day of excessive hammer usage we now have bigger discs and fancy red brake pads. These will make the car go faster, because they are red, and everyone knows that red 'uns go faster.

There was also a lot of cocking about with graduation ceremonies. Because graduating was less interesting to me than essential car maintenance, I took fewer photos. In fact I took only one photograph the whole day, of the bread boat captained by a grapey pirate that Dr Sister constructed using only bits of her ploughman's lunch.

So you'll have to invent pictures in your head using the power of mental thinking to accompany the following bullet point summary of the day.

• Apoplectic scheduling anxiety in the morning, despite going through everything the night before using a D20 to determine how punctual/sober/clothed people would be. Miscellaneous toy soldiers were used to represent all the important people, with coasters used to represent key locations and pieces of shortbread used to represent pudding.
• The Pixie looked delightful in her summery dress.
• I shook some old geezers hand, and now I'm qualified to do stuff.
• Lunch, beer, etc.
• We went to the aquarium. There were lots of fish, but no oversized pencils in the gift shop.
• Big Chinese dinner, beer, etc.

Essentially, the day started stressfully; but got immediately and immeasurably better once the ceremony was done and complimentary booze and cakes was made available .

prophets of FaDoom pt.5

...and then these guys showed up.

Dümbar forgets exactly when or how the foetid creatures appeared. There was obviously a time when their rotting stench didn't permeate his very consciousness, but it all seems a very long time ago now. He is fairly certain that it is all the bastard skull mace's doing.

He is fairly certain that they want him dead.

In fact, there seems to be almost no end to the variety of ways in which Dümbar might meet his end. He could be horribly maimed by maniacs that believe he has magical powers, or slaughtered by one of the countless other bands of lunatics that seem so curiously obsessed with shards of green rock, he might succumb to one of the hideous plagues or poxes that seem to have blighted so many of his followers of late, he could have his skin eaten by the hideous fly-headed mutant of his own creation, or he could be suddenly transformed into a whiff of green vapour by that shrieking bastard skull mace.

Aekold Fastidious Dümbar, known to his followers as The Great Prophet FaDoom, has finally come to realise that he is in fact utterly doomed.

prophets of FaDoom pt.4

Whilst the majority of Dümbar's followers are weapon-toting bearded lunatics with such a tenuous grip on reality that meteorite insurance seemed like a wise investment, this is not the case for all of them.

Torvald Blasphemy and Helsinki Abominator are a pair of alarmingly antisocial young men who, prior to the devastation of Mordheim, attempted to make a living as musicians. They were not generally well received by the public. This could have been for any number of reasons; because of their predilection for corpse paint, the way they played their lutes really really fast, that they preferred grunts and shrieks in lieu of any actual singing, all of their songs were about Chaos gods, that they would occasionally burn down the odd temple of Sigmar, or because people had been brainwashed by corporate mainstream bards and just weren't ready for anything as real as them yet.

In any case, when Mordheim got levelled and society collapsed Torvald and Helsinki found the bleak aftermath much more to their liking. Amongst the smouldering ruins countless extremist cults sprung up seemingly overnight, and it seemed as though these two malcontents may at last find something that they could belong to.

Sadly for them, they soon found out that life in a proper Chaos cult involves an awful lot of very tedious ceremony and was not anywhere near as wilfully destructive, anarchic and... well... chaotic as they would have liked. For months they lurched from one cult to the next, never able to stick with any for too long before the ultimate badass leader of said cult would tire of their preposterous cocking about and banish them from his sight. Torvald and Helsinki were slowly coming to the conclusion that all these jerks must have been brainwashed by corporate mainstream cults and just weren't ready for anything as real as them yet, and were on the verge of leaving Mordheim altogether when they encountered some of the Disciples of FaDoom, rummaging through bins behind the burnt ruins of an alehouse. They heard tales of the Great Prophet FaDoom, of how he foresaw the doom of Mordheim, of how he could transform men into hideous beasts with blasts of green fire from his mighty skull mace, of how he sometimes didn't seem to know exactly what was going on...

Dümbar doesn't like Torvald or Helsinki. Their wild and unpredictable nature makes him nervous, but he's too scared of them to ask them to leave. Occasionally he will wave the skull mace at them in the hope that it will sort things out for him; but the damn thing just cackles maniacally and then incinerates something else entirely before getting back to shouting at him in that incomprehensible northern tongue.

Torvald and Helsinki find these vulgar displays of Dümbar's power quite awe inspiring, and on the whole are pleased to have finally found a home where they can cause as much havoc as they like, and play their lutes as fast and as loud as they please all night with no complaints.

Dümbar is fairly certain that Torvald and Helsinki want him dead.

prophets of FaDoom pt.3

Of course, not everyone was immediately convinced of Dümbar's powers. Amongst the mob of bearded loonies that first sought out Dümbar's shabby hovel was one Helmut Blaueflasche, an especially unhinged militia veteran prone to conspiracy theories and occasional moments of terrifying clarity. Helmut had a few questions for Dümbar; like why, if he had indeed predicted the arrival of a city-flattening meteorite, had he not fled to safety beforehand? And also, where was his goddamn money?

Helmut would never find out. As Dümbar stood before the mob proclaiming himself to be a great prophet and doomseer, Helmut got as far as "Yeah, but hang on a minute..." when he was cut short by the skull mace that Dümbar was waving about above his head. To the surprise of everyone (most especially Dümbar himself), the skull atop the mace began shrieking in some ancient northern tongue. The empty sockets of the skull began to glow with an eerie green fire, and as the shrieking became more agitated bolts of fire shot the eyes of the skull and struck Helmut, consuming him in flame and smoke.

The mob fell silent. The silence gave way to gasps of horror and astonishment as the smoke cleared, revealing that rather than being destroyed by the baleful green fire Helmut had been transformed into a hideous fly-headed mutant. Clearly the Great Prophet FaDoom was also a mighty sorcerer...

Dümbar found this more than a little alarming, but figured it was best to play along if he was to convince the rest of the lunatics of his arcane credentials. He has subsequently attempted, on numerous occasions, to rid himself of the terrifying skull mace; but somehow it always seems to find its way back to his side. He can't understand any of the skull's demented shrieking, but it frequently seems quite irate; and the only solution seems to be to point it towards someone or something, at which point something terrible involving green fire happens and the shrieking turns to more of an insane cackling. Dümbar is fairly certain that the skull mace wants him dead.

As for Helmut, he is able to understand the skull's ranting perfectly well; but since his mouth has been transformed into a hideous proboscis he is unable to share this knowledge with anyone else. Therefore it is for reasons known only to Helmut himself that he sticks around. Dümbar is fairly certain that Helmut wants him dead.

prophets of FaDoom pt.2

On reflection, it is quite easy to see how the kind of people that would spend money on meteorite insurance would also be so willing to believe that Dümbar had arcane powers of foresight; and when his prophetic vision of meteoric annihilation was realised they soon sought him out, eager to learn of new and more improbable ways that they might all be meeting their terrible doom in the near future.

Like all good con artists, Dümbar tended to prey upon the more mentally infirm; and so it is no coincidence that the majority of the "Brethren of FaDoom" are somewhat elderly and, more often than not, raving mad. Most are former militia, veterans of countless grisly wars against the greenskins and beasts of Chaos in the vast, dense forests of the Empire. For some the war never ended, and many kept a few weapons after they were retired from frontline service just in case society crumbled.

Which is quite convenient.