I’m going to just keep writing about Greathelm because I like it a lot. If you have no clue what I’m talking about then go look at the review and the board I made for it already. 

Easily the stupidest hobby project I’ve ever taken on. Chatting in our discord last week I asked, as a joke: “What’s the most Goonhammer reskin of Greathelm that could exist?” Very much expecting Greg/Gregbot to be somehow involved. Until Rob showed up in the Historical channel out of nowhere slamming in the Goonhammer Historical Banner image and immediately leaving. 

He was right. 

So here we are, less than two weeks later with me building my first ever Rubicon kit, a sprue of Victrix Normans, with the dream of a good bit to lead me. 

So, here it is, some rules tweaks so that you can play a game of Greathelm: The Goonhammer Historicals Banner. 

If you’re not entirely sure what I mean by the Goonhammer Historicals Banner then you either need to read more Historicals articles (at least mine) or just pay more attention to the image that they all start with. Now, I don’t know the exact story behind why it’s a group of Normans marching against an M10 Tank Destroyer in the aesthetic of the Bayeux Tapestry, but it is. Those Normans are aptly titled the “Noble Defenders” while the M10 is, of course, labeled both cowardly and perfidious. So if you’re like me and enjoy a project as a bit while the rest of your pile of shame looks from the corner primed or unpainted then this is for you! Also if you simply already have a group of Normans and an M10 to hand, which describes a surprising amount of our reader base. 

When it came to painting these I opted for full accuracy. Not historical accuracy, of course, but banner image accuracy. The Norman Noble Defenders are painted in bright blue, green, and orange-red with brown boots and spears while the M10 is just green and brown with a black M2 .50 cal machine gun and a white star. Simple. This almost hurt me to paint just covering chainmail, pouches, belts, and any other details in a simple block colour. It was freeing, too. If you’re trying to achieve full historical accuracy with these rules then you need to do the same or feel the shame of a gamer forgoing accuracy. 

The Rules 

You’ll need a copy of the Greathelm rules for this one with the following tweaks. This has not been playtested thoroughly (or pretty much at all); it’s a joke and a bit of fun, it’s not that serious. 

Noble Defenders 

A group of eight (because that’s a single Victrix sprue of Normans, no other reason) Noble Defenders. Really you can use any models with melee weapons and shields here. If you want to use a mix of melee weapons that’s fine, I don’t care, but if you want to be historically accurate like me you’ll be using shields and spears on all of them. 

Because of how the poses work on these models, we’re also counting all of the spears as javelins as well, which can be fired like a bow. They’re also allowed to throw their javelins at the cowardly, perfidious tank even while a friendly model is in base contact with it; it’s big, of course they can! 

Noble Defenders are incredibly brave, which means they will only ever fail a courage test on a 6 regardless of any other modifiers that might exist. They almost don’t care at all that their allies are being blown to pieces turn after turn! Almost. 

Noble Defenders are not able to use Bash actions against the cowardly tank (it’s too big to push around!) but instead during Step 4 may make a Rallying Cry once per turn to automatically return one slain Noble Defender back to the table touching any board edge, and yes, it can be within base contact of the tank.  

Cowardly, Perfidious Tank 

The M10 is a single model and has 20 wounds instead of the normal 3 making it much harder to take down and will only suffer Pierced armour results from melee attacks, those thrown javelins can’t get quite that lucky. The player controlling the M10 will also always have six initiative dice. 

The tank, being a tank, only has guns to fire with and cannot make melee attacks at all, ever, it’s too cumbersome to run over anyone with its tracks; that means it won’t be performing Bash actions, either. Sorry tank, but you’re just far too cowardly. And perfidious. 

Speaking of Cowardice, the normal rules for courage tests aren’t going to work here. Instead of testing normally, the M10 must test its courage every turn regardless of it having taken any damage or being in combat at the time. During the first turn it will automatically pass the test, it’s still early on, maybe it’s still alive even so far! From turn two onwards it gets more difficult, needing to pass on a 2+ in the second turn, a 3+ in the third turn, and so on until it will simply fail and run away at the end of the seventh turn if it has somehow been courageous enough to pass all other checks up to this point. You might think this is stupid, and I agree. I didn’t say this was good. It’s historical. 

The cowardly, perfidious tank has two ranged weapons to make use of: M35 tank gun and M2 heavy machine gun. The M35 will fire as a crossbow but not use an extra dice to fire, gets +3 on its attack roll, and will automatically cause a pierced result. Noble Defenders cannot choose to Block an M35 shell either, they can only Dodge against this attack. Being cowardly and perfidious doesn’t stop it from still having a massive gun. The M2 fires as a bow with no bonus but can shoot any number of times each turn and the Noble Defenders may Block with their shields as normal. 

Winning the Game 

You’ve both already won simply by agreeing to play such a stupid idea. Truly, it’s clear that no one involved with this venture cares about historically accurate wargaming or being very serious. Well done to you. 

No really, the tank needs to kill eight Noble Defenders before it runs away to win otherwise the Noble Defenders win. Does this mean that the Noble Defenders have an easier game? Sure, maybe, possibly, who knows? Try rolling better if you keep losing, that usually helps me in games.

If you liked this then stay tuned, we have many more ideas of reskins or add-on rules for this game with our Discord absolutely buzzing about it. Just be warned the other ones coming are going to actually be somewhat serious instead of this.

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