BAM! That’s Round 1 in the tin. Our players around the world have been playing games and logging wins, cracking out the paintbrush and capturing territory for their alliance.

As a reminder, Secrets of the Agloraxi is a Matched Play campaign where our players are logging their own regular competitive games against their own opponents, with a map-conquest stage taking place between every two-week round.

Our players have assembled into three factions, each seeking to unlock the Secrets of the Agloraxi to achieve their own goals:

• The Free Ghur Corsairs are a ruthless band of Orruk and Grot pirates who sail the treacherous seas of the Mortal Realms, plundering merchant ships and coastal settlements. Known for their savage raiding tactics and chaotic, unpredictable nature, they are fiercely united under their charismatic (and often mad) leaders, whose vision of freedom on the high seas keeps the crew loyal and bloodthirsty.
• The Drakmire Lords in Exile once ruled the prosperous city of Drakmire, until the arrival of a band of Ogors seeking refuge within the city’s walls. Initially welcomed as mercenaries and labourers, the Ogors cunningly ingratiated themselves into the city’s criminal underworld, gradually consolidating power. Over time, they transformed into a ruthless gangster-politician class, corrupting the city’s leadership and manipulating the system for their own gain. With the Ogors ultimately controlling the city’s politics, the Drakmire Lords were ousted, their noble bloodline shattered. Now exiled, they rely on cunning alliances, dark magic, and brutal mercenaries to one day return to their city and crush the Ogors who betrayed them.
• The Cult of the Agloraxi is a fanatical group of Chaos worshippers who believe their ancestors — the once-mighty rulers of a vast, ancient empire — have returned from the afterlife to guide them. Visited by spectral manifestations of their forebears, the cultists are driven by the vision of resurrecting their long-fallen civilization, now empowered by the dark blessings of the Chaos Gods. Obsessed with reclaiming the power and glory of the Agloraxi dynasty, they seek to plunge the world into chaos, believing that only through destruction and upheaval can the empire’s former greatness be restored.

You can check out the full intro here, and the starting map is below. So let’s smash into it and see how it’s all been progressing!

Round One In Summary

Free Ghur Corsairs and Lords in Exile were tied on 4 wins each, which meant a roll-off for priority in conquering territory – which the Corsairs won, giving them first dibs. Total Wins are their own currency in this game, giving teams priority in claiming new land, and allowing territory to be taken from teams with fewer wins: shit only rolls downhill.

Teams can earn DPs (the primary win condition) in two ways: by holding territory, or directly by contributing to the campaign. This includes playing games, doing hobby (including thematic conversions) and writing lore for their army and its actions. Cult of the Agloraxi were most active overall, with more players playing more games and bashing out more hobby. So they have earned an early lead on campaign points.

In terms of conquering the map, all teams exercised their right to conquer two lands. The Lords in Exile pushed north through the Scoured Forest and Coast of Ill Omen, as did the Cult of the Agloraxi through the Slaughterfields and Sporehollows, while the Free Ghur Corsairs spread across the Searing Sea and Razorfang Sprawl. The latter both buttressed their adjoining territories by Fortifying the adjoining Slaughterfields and Searing Sea, making them more difficult to steal in future rounds.

So this is how we ended up:

So shall we take a look at how we got there?

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Free Ghur Corsairs

• P’tit Fut – Gloomspite
• QldThunder – Gloomspite
• Furythrow2 – Kruleboyz
• Catfish Billy – Kruleboyz
• Maximus – Kruleboyz

P’tit Fut

P’tit Fut came up with the coolest idea so far in this whole campaign: apparently real-life pirates lived by their own code, so this team is currently writing their own Pirate Code! Can’t wait to see it when it’s done.

In the meantime, Fut has painted up a these Snarlfang Riders for his Gits army, and played a bunch of games too.

Gaming Roundup

P’tit Fut squeezed in three games: wins vs Ogors and Nurgle, and a defeat by Lumineth.

P’tit Fut dropped his final game of the round 32-38 against Sundstar’s LRL, and there was a learning point to share from that one:

All of my previous games, taking the double turn was always pretty straightforward. It was a matter of crushing all hope and I nearly took it this time too on turn 4. But forfeiting the 4 points (with the opposing player probably scoring 7 or 8) would have crushed all of my chances. I talked it through a little bit with my opponent (a seasoned player) and I decided not to take it.

It was my first game that went all the way to turn 5 and I really need to pay more attention to the scoring possibilities when we go to the final round. On a side note, at the end of turn 3 I was sure I would get destroyed. But I tried my best and nearly got an upset. It’s cliché but nothing is done as long as the game isn’t.

Campaign

Fut has named his heroes:

• The Fungoid Cave Shaman will be named Billy the Kick. It’s a French music group that is famous for a song Mangez moi (“Eat Me”), the story of an hallucinogenic mushroom that begs to be eaten. Very appropriate.
• The Rabble Rowza was an easy one: because of his ability on monsters and beasts he will be named Sébastien which is the name of my little brother. He was funnily annoying when we were kids, and he still is. (Does that make me a beast or a monster? Who knows).

• The Squigboss will be Boule. It’s the name of a character in a French comic books series (Boule et Bill). He is the owner of a dog (Bill) and they do all kind of mini adventures. A little bit like Calvin and Hobbes.
• As for the Troggboss, his name will be Leroy Jenkins. That’s because of my last game. Looking straight in the eyes of the Lumineth infantry and cavalry, he decided to charge outside of the Bad Moon’s aura. It didn’t end well, as you can see in the picture.

P’tit Fut has set the scene for his next game vs Gloomspite:

Boule, Sébastien and Billy were arguing about where to land. It was either the shore in front, on the left or on the right. No one had actually a strategic explanation but were firmly set on their respective “plans”. Sébastien was bored by the long debate and decided to annoy Leroy. In a matter of minutes the trolls chased the git around the boat, crushing everything in their path. Soon, water was pouring through the hull and an emergency landing had to be done… Straight ahead. “Perfect” muttered Sébastien with a grin. It was his destination of choice.

After a few nights of drinking they decided to venture forth and explore the land to find clues about the fabled secrets of Agloraxi. They soon encountered Ogors, apparently there for an entirely other matter. Grunts were exchanged, blank stares were given and names were called. So battle ensued. The Gitz pirates handily destroyed their opponents, leaving only two alive to tell the tale.

Smelling something foul, Billy, always in search of new tastes, asked to follow the scent. They encountered a huge army of Lumineth Aelves that were studying footprints and rotten fungus. They were tracking a mob of Maggotkin of Nurgle. The Gitz decided to track the Nurgle Daemons to get there first and steal whatever the Lumineth were after. (The size of the Aelves’ army had nothing to do with this decision).

After a few days of searching (and eating rotten mushrooms) they heard the roar of a Great Unclean One. The Moon was shining over their heads once again filling them with unending rage. It was time for battle! This was a very difficult victory that was made easier by the exhaustion of the enemy army (Nurgle Daemons need their sleep and nap too). Drunken with power and crazed by the Bad Moon’s light, they decided to party on the spot of the battlefield. But while they were partying, drinking and smashing down mushrooms the Lumineth army charged. It was a close battle but it saw the Aelves victorious and the Gitz were forced to retreat.

But before tending their wounds they had to do something far more important: assign blame. The simple bickering soon turned into a full blown battle. Today two armies faces each other: Two Gloomspite Gitz armies will soon clash to see who’s right. About what ? They don’t remember. But it doesn’t matter as long as the right side is victorious.

Roundup

Elsewhere for the Corsairs, Maximus and Ben L both cracked out their armies:

The rest of the team has been quiet, so hopefully they can kick on in Round 2…

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Drakmire Lords in Exile

• Graal – Seraphon
• Farmhammer – Stormcast
• Will – Cities
• Bingus – Sons of Behemat

Graal

Graal (Hakan) smashed out a couple of big wins with his lizards.

Game One was against cavalry Gitz (2×20 Hoppers, 2×5 Bounders, Kraggy, Shaman, Squigboss, and a unit of Herd). He chose to take the first turn (probably a mistake), and launched the Hoppers at me. Kraggy didn’t fit so he missed out, don’t know if he just misjudged the space. We learnt just how tanky lizards can be, where he killed maybe 2 Saurus Guard (2+ 5++, with -1 rend and -1 attack and AoD) with that one unit. Raptadons overperformed and killed 14 Hoppers before they got to fight. On turn 2 Kraggy tried but failed to kill Kroak (did 6 damage), and he was chipped down by top of turn 3, after which my opponent conceded.

Game Two was against Joel McGrath’s BoC. I learnt about why you don’t shoot at them (2D6 move into combat). He kindly offered a take back but I declined it, to suffer the hard lesson instead. Aggradons with a 5++ held a flank against Bestigors and Centigors while Kroak and his entourage held down the centre (Shifting Objectives). Even after a double turn 2->3 for Joel he couldn’t shift the lizards. Kroak counter-casting to kill off his general and preventing recursion was a key moment he learned from. Joel conceded after the failed double. So two great games, and two lessons.

Graal’s Campaign

Itzibitzi, the Starseer, had been feeling down. Ever since he called on Lord Kroak’s help in reclaiming Drakmire, he had lost control of his cold-blooded band of warriors. It figures, the venerable toa… Defender of Itza would take command of the army, but Lord Kroak didn’t seem overly interested in the fate of Drakmire. Instead he commanded the army to go after Kragnos and an infestation of squig-riding Grots. Guess comet-dropping isn’t suitable to recover a city, and he’d rather fight the God of Earthquakes.

During battle, Itzibitzi finally had an opportunity to show his value and perhaps get in a better standing with Lord Kroak and once again direct efforts back to the recapture of Drakmire. In the tempest of battle, as Kragnos was bearing down on the Seraphon’s defensive lines, Itzibitzi harnessed the power of Azyr to align the stars just so, removing Kragnos’ magical defenses and spelling doom for the last of the Drogrukh. Perhaps now he’d be able to suggest to Lord Kroak to do something about those Ogors…

Roundup

Grant (Farmhammer) cracked out these Reclusians for his Stormcast, with a really sweet dark green-and-cream scheme:

While Bingus punched out a whole bunch of games:

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Cult of the Agloraxi

• ThomasX – Nighthaunt
• Xander – S2D
• Manic – S2D
• John Triplow – Nurgle

ThomasX

Thomas played his first AoS game of 2025 for this campaign, which was a loss unfortunately (but still two DPs for the team):

The game was Nighthaunt Vs CoS in Feral Foray. I brought the Ushoran RoR along with BGR/Hexwraiths/ Reikenor/Lord Executioner/ Spirit Hosts. It was a close loss, mainly because I lost my round 4 BT (“Do not Waiver”), as I disregarded the fact that I had a Spirit Host with 1 wound left (which I could have retreated without mortal damage) next to a unit of 7 Hammerers (I managed to kill 6 of them with Ushoran and Morbheg Knights, but the last remaining Hammerer took out my Spirit Host).

Other highlights: a unit of cavaliers survived the charge from Ushoran and 20 BGR (80 attacks with extra rend against cavalry) – I managed to kill 6 models 😥. Before dying, Reikenor countercasted the anti-horde NH spell (Spirit Drain) and after spiking 5+, he managed to kill half a unit of Executioners who were ready to charge my unit of BGRs!

After the previous bitter defeat, Lord Executioner Valrac the Cruel, the leading figure of the Nighthaunt army – who has been tasked by Lady O to establish the power of the NH in the Flamescar Plateau by “helping” the Cult of the Agloraxi (i.e. exploiting their superstitions about their ancestors) – took his revenge against Pontifex and her CoS army. This time, he decided to avoid the unstable alliance with Ushoran and his Regiment of Renown and relied instead on the brutal force of NH infantry with the help of Black Coaches and the critical support of Awlrach the Drowner.

John Triplow

John’s Nurgle scraped a draw against Troggs, with the takeaway being that it’s seriously hard work when Nurgle are not able to get the disease to stick!

John also managed to get his Rotmire based, and they’re looking schmick:

Xander

Over to you, maestro:

Of course the Dark Master would seek the power of the ancient Agloraxi for himself. Be’lakor’s vanguard in the Flamescar Plateau consists of a motley assortment of warriors from the Eightpoints, held together by malice and iron will, all seeking personal glory for themselves before the gaze of the dark gods. The Chaos Lord Zargon the Virulent leads his black iron-clad warriors from atop an ill-tempered karkadrak beast. His warband consists of warriors, Chosen and traitor Varanguard who’ve turned their coats from the Three-eyed King to serve the First Prince. The Red Bull lives for single combat. He was the most feared champion of the Varanspire’s under-pits, but when those arenas held no challenge for him any more he joined the Dark Master’s service. He leads a mighty band of Goroan Theridons, eager to prove their worth. Finally, Melek-toth, Lord of the Prism is a Gaunt Summoner aiding Be’lakor for their own inscrutable reasons.

Although they pretend to loyally serve Archaon, the power of the Prism allows them to split their consciousness and appear in two places at once. No sooner had the warband made their first foray into the Agloraxi ruins than they were set upon by a howling horde of beastmen. As the creatures attempted to ambush them from all sides, Melek-toth diverted the power of a nearby realmgate to manifest the Chosen behind enemy lines, where they set about butchering the beasts and smashing their profane herdstone. Although the creatures continued to strike from different directions, the line of dark warriors held firm, and soon there was nothing left of the beastmen but stinking corpses. The path into the ruins now lay open to Be’lakor’s servants, and glory seemed within their grasp…

Manic

Manic was able to punch out a couple of games with their S2D:

Game One was a club match against Michael Tunes of PNW US Masters team and Battleshock fame. Michael was running OBR with 2 catapults, a reinforced unit of Archai and the RoR with Manfred against my Gaunt Summoner list with 3 big blocks of Chosen, Theridons and Knights.

Michael castled up, I gave him first turn and he proceeded to yeet his Archai across the board and delete my Theridons. In my turn I failed two 9″ charges with the 3d6 charging Chosen, failed to win the double and proceeded to get my Chosen beaten up by Archai and Grave Guard. To rub salt in the wound Manfred redeployed into combat with my Knights that were coming to save my Chosen and that was about that. Great game against a fantastic player.

Game Two was against Andrew, also of Battleshock fame and also like Michael another clubmate, running Cities. Largely standard Cities list with Hammerers, Executioners, Fusiliers and a big block of Darkriders. I took this game as an opportunity to test exactly how stupidly far you can launch a unit using the Gaunt Summoner.

The answer is really freaking far. Starting on my line 9′ away from the centre I yeeted the 3d6 charging banner Theridons diagionally across the board and into his Darkriders on his back edge. Unfortunately I didn’t fully commit to the rest of the yeeting and underestimated exactly how fast a foot slogging cities army can be between orders, foot sergeant and normal movement. In short order 2 of 3 big hammers were pinned down and taken out. Still another fun game, and my first run against cities in 4th ❤

On the hobby front, Manic also finished up his new Chaos Sorcerer just in time. May he forever make his 3+ oracular visions rolls.

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So that’s Round One! The second round is already underway, so check back soon for the next update on the hunt for the Secrets of the Agloraxi – the factions are closing in on each so after a round of jostling for early board position, we should be about to see some fireworks, with territory stolen from rivals and maybe even blasted off the board with sun-lasers that could drop a God.

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