This is an account of the warband I brought to NEMO, the New England Mordheim Open, in May 2025. Part 1 is the text of a zine I brought with me to hand out to my opponents. It’s background lore to explain who my Marauders of chaos are and why they’re in Mordheim. Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 are a sort of narrative battle report of the three games I played at NEMO.
The boom of another mortar round shook the hall of the ruined fortress where the Sorcerer and his Tong warband lay in hiding. As he sat listening to the impacts of the shells, watching the dust fall from the dilapidated ceiling, the Sorcerer pondered the events of the previous days. How had they failed so utterly? After months of searching, slaying, and following the will of the gods, he had at last found the place of power that was promised to him. But when he communed with the statue of the Lady of Carnage, he had felt…nothing. Had she deemed him unworthy? Had the gods abandoned him?
No. It was that weakling, Halgrim. Halgrim had failed the gods and the gods had cursed them all for it. The Sorcerer was not cut off from their power, but he could no longer hear their will. No, they had not completely forsaken him. They were merely waiting for him to prove himself worthy again. He needed to offer another sacrifice to get back into their good graces.
BOOM!
And he needed one fast if he was going to escape these imperial handgunners which had been hounding him ever since he fled Mordheim…
BA-BOOM!
…and that cursed mortar.
“UP! You dogs!” he barked at the Tong marauders. “The gods are looking unfavorably upon us for this sorry display. We are men of the north! We do not cower before the guns of the southern weaklings!”
BOOM!
Reluctantly, the tribesmen got to their feet and hefted their weapons. They looked around nervously, waiting to be told what to do. The Sorcerer could see they needed a display of power to encourage them. He snarled in disdain at their weakness. But he knew it was the only way.
“Bring me his body!” he snapped. The group parted and one of the Tong dragged Halgrim’s mangled corpse forward, dropping it before the Sorcerer’s feet. He had commanded them to carry the body of this failure back to the North so that he could burn it on Valkaati’s offering pyres with the rest of the scum they conquered. But he would have to settle for performing the offering here and now if he wanted to survive. He cut his hand and walked around Halgrim’s body, dripping a circle of blood as he went.
“Unto thee O Powers Beyond I offer the blood of your servant, Unto the fires of this altar, I offer the flesh of the false. Halgrim! I name thee, Enemy!“
At this, Halgrim’s body burst into flames, but he was not consumed. The fire seemed to linger expectantly, a tension hung in the air. The Sorcerer smiled darkly. It was working. The gods were in attendance.
“You who were chosen by the gods, Yet withered beneath their mighty gaze, I cast your spirit forth into the void! May your skull hasten to the Throne!”
Halgrim’s unseeing eyes sprang open. His lungs drew no breath, and yet he screamed. The Sorcerer began to shout, his voice hoarse, his eyes wild…
“O gods of chaos, I adjure you, accept this sacrifice! I bind unto myself, the power to destroy my enemies! By the fourfold names, Kharneth! Slaaneth! Nurgh’leth! Tzeen’neth!
As his incantation drew to a crescendo a foul unnatural wind blew through the fortress, swirling around Halgrim and the Sorcerer. The flames surrounding Halgrim’s body blew out and everything became deathly still and quiet. The Sorcerer scowled, looked at his hands, and touched his face. He didn’t feel any different. Had the gods rejected his sacrifice? He looked down at Halgrim’s body and recoiled in shock. Halgrim’s previously glassy unseeing eyes were now focused on the Sorcerer, a look of terrified confusion twisted his features.
“Where am- AAGHHH!” Halgrim managed to rasp out before something unseen contorted his form into a painful unnatural pose. Halgrim’s body arched backwards and he stood up awkwardly on his hands and feet, his chest with its ugly axe wound pressed towards the ceiling. His body began to swell. His limbs lengthened painfully, his bones audibly breaking, twisting, and resetting with a series of wet pops. His ribs cracked and elongated, bursting through his flesh to form fangs around the massive gaping mouth that had formed from his axe wound. Around the glistening meat of the wound, eyes boiled and ripped their way through his skin. They rolled crazily in their sockets, never focusing on anything. Or else focusing on things that could not be seen with natural eyes.
Through all of this, he screamed as his head dangled uselessly upside down. But at last it contorted and twisted around backwards to face the Sorcerer. It vomited blood which steamed and ate into the stone floor where it landed. The Sorcerer watched horrified as the last light of Halgrim’s fire faded from his eyes, and he descended fully into spawndom.
BOOM!
A mortar shell exploded through the far wall. The Sorcerer and his warband were knocked to the ground. Light and smoke filled the chamber. When he recovered, the Sorcerer could see the spawn running through the breach into the light of day.
“Follow it, you dogs!” he cried. “The gods have shown us their favor! Do not disappoint them or you will suffer the same fate!” It wasn’t the boon he’d asked for. They had not granted him the power personally, but the whims of the gods were unpredictable. He took it as a sign that they wanted him alive. They still had some greater purpose for him, but he had not yet earned a place back into their good graces. The gods were not known to grant second chances, so he did not intend to waste this. He would not be found unworthy a second time.
Emerging from the dark into the light of day through the damaged fortress wall, the Sorcerer saw that the battlefield was pure chaos. To his right, a Tong marauder vanished in a geyser of rock, dirt, and pink mist as another mortar shell impacted the courtyard. All around him the tribesmen were falling to the guns of the southlings, or else taking cover behind piles of rubble. Up ahead he saw the spawn flailing and spinning wildly within the front ranks of the enemy gunline. He watched as their bodies were tossed limply into the air. Good, that would open them up for a charge. But up on the wall, he could see the mortar team reloading and realigning their weapon. They were going to fire on their own frontline to destroy the spawn.
Uttering unpronounceable syllables which caused his ears to ring, the Sorcerer stretched out his hand and black lightning erupted from his scorched fingertips. He smiled through bloody teeth as he watched the mortar team explode into a cloud of embers and ash.
Seeing this, the imperial captain raised the company standard in an attempt to rally his men, and charged. He realized too late that his men weren’t following him and he was charging into the spawn alone. The Sorcerer watched as the battle standard fell and the captain was trampled beneath the fleshy hoofs of the spawn. He laughed exultantly as he realized they were facing a penal unit. The rank and file soldiers were prisoners, and they had just watched their jailer die. Without anyone to command them, surely they would rout.
“Slaves of the empire!” the Sorcerer shouted. “See how your guns are silenced by the power of the dark gods! Your proud banners are rags! Your gilded breastplates are empty! Nothing beats within them but a coward’s heart. The Empire is your prison! Join us and be free! Or die as whimpering mongrel dogs of Sigmar!”
That last line of his speech was a mistake. The prisoners rallied and charged into the spawn. Fresh tentacles exploded from the mouth atop its chest and began to whip the men into the air. But they didn’t falter. They rushed in, frantically beating the creature with the butts of their handguns and stabbing it with their camp knives. Many of them were crushed, bisected, and devoured by the beast, but to the Sorcerer’s astonishment, they eventually brought it down.
The Sorcerer readied himself, expecting them to regroup and charge. Instead, one of them bent down to pull the company standard from beneath the steaming bulk of the dead spawn. Reverently, he rolled the flag up and threw it over his shoulder. Then as one, they all turned to climb back through the opening in the outer wall they had entered through, and disappeared over the rubble.
The surviving Tong marauders began to gather around the Sorcerer, looking to him for what to do next. He was growing tired of leadership. He was surrounded by weaklings with no ambition. He closed his eyes and focused all his thoughts on this spark of hatred within his breast. He fanned it into a flame, and stoked it until it became a raging inferno which his body could no longer contain. With a wordless shout, black fire exploded outward from his body, igniting everything and everyone around him. He watched as the Tong fell to their knees, charring into grisly black statues, monuments to mediocrity. He longed for an equal, a challenger, an opponent, a companion upon the Path to Glory. And he realized he was going to miss Halgrim Skullhammer.
Kitbash Chaos 
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