Vastarian: Houston 2024 Day 3

With immense mental fortitude, Saint Voskhodh - the Voice of the Outer Dark, clawed their way back from the brink of doom, escaping the damning clutches of the Empyrean, intent on activating the lighthouse at Ravachol.

It is hard to fathom, but it has been over a year since we, with the help of Bill Ford, hosted our first Inq28 narrative event: Vastarian - Dreams of the Pious! While we covered the first two days of the event (see here and here), life intervened, and we did not share what happened on the final day. We wanted to rectify this and start sharing how the event concluded! On the final day, all the participants played multiple simultaneous games, culminating in the final confrontation at the hyperradiant lighthouse in Ravachol, Vastarian. We plan to post numerous updates documenting the chaos of these games, aiming to give readers a glimpse into the multiple narratives unfolding. Hopefully, this time it will not take an entire year to finish!

Vastarian: Church Raid

The Cult of the Lantern (created by rojasnoirlac) has made its way to Ravachol, Vastarian.

Recently, when Bill Ford was in Maryland for a work trip, we had the good fortune of meeting up with him and Dave Taylor! Not wanting to miss the opportunity to roll some dice, we were able to set up Bill’s Chapel board and play a game within our Vastarian setting! Below are some photos from the game with a loose narrative conveyed in the captions.

Vastarian: Houston 2024 Day 2

Death Was The Colour.

Here at Between the Bolter and Me, we have spent the entirety of 2024 working on Vastarian - Dreams of the Pious, our Warhammer 40,000 setting. During that time, we have been encouraging others to get involved with it as a collaborative worldbuilding effort. The setting revolves around the cathedral world of Vastarian, which is home to hundreds of disparate Imperial religious sects, each venerating the God-Emperor of Mankind in their own unique way. The opening of the Cicatrix Maledictum, a great tear in the fabric of the Milky Way Galaxy, has resulted in a psychic awakening across the populace of Vastarian. Each religious sect on the planet now believes that they alone were blessed with a psychic emissary touched by the Emperor himself. The tenuous peace on Vastarian has now devolved to bloodshed and persecution. During this psychic turmoil, the purifying radiance of the Emperor, the Astronomican, plummeted as if it were a tallow candle guttering in a tumultuous wind. In desperation, many of the Spyrehead conclaves on the planet pooled their resources and delved deeply into crumbling treatises on the nature of astropathic beacons and put into motion a fantastical gambit: fortifying the principle lighthouse in Ravachol as a psychic conduit to amplify the waning Astronomican.

In an effort to continue developing the setting, with the help of Bill Ford we hosted our first Inq28 narrative event at Asgard Games from November 15-17. You can read about the first day of the event here. The second day was the core of the entire event, where participants played three games that would lead up to a final game the following day (Day 3). There would be no way for us to capture every game played during the event, but we want to share pictures and write some evocative captions to help convey what happened in the games we were involved in. We hope you enjoy them!

Vastarian 2024: Rules and Scenarios

Wizard Fight!

Now that the first official Vastarian event has concluded we wanted to provide the rule system and scenarios we used, for anyone that is interested. We encourage everyone to make use of the material and get together with friends to play and create new stories on Vastarian! Feel free to modify the rules as you see fit, we certainly did when playing games!

Vastarian 2024: Participant Cults, Terrain, and other contributions.

The lighthouse at Ravachol, Vastarian.

We recently got back from holding our first Inq28 narrative event alongside Bill Ford, based in our Vastarian - Dreams of the Pious setting. It wouldn’t have been possible without all of the amazing participants and people who created models and terrain for the event. We wanted to use this post to showcase all of the amazing Cults that were present at the event, along with any other donated model, terrain, or game board!

Vastarian: Houston 2024 Day 1

We have all seen the signs in our dreams and know deep in our marrow that our apocalypse is nigh. But all is not lost, for we put our Faith in Him (Model created by Isaac @weirdingsway, Presbyter Alcubierre the Blind - Bastard Scion of Navredo House Oberth).

Here at Between the Bolter and Me, we have spent the entirety of 2024 working on Vastarian - Dreams of the Pious, our Warhammer 40,000 setting. During that time, we have been encouraging others to get involved with it as a collaborative worldbuilding effort. The setting revolves around the cathedral world of Vastarian, which is home to hundreds of disparate Imperial religious sects, each venerating the God-Emperor of Mankind in their own unique way. The opening of the Cicatrix Maledictum, a great tear in the fabric of the Milky Way Galaxy, has resulted in a psychic awakening across the populace of Vastarian. Each religious sect on the planet now believes that they alone were blessed with a psychic emissary touched by the Emperor himself. The tenuous peace on Vastarian has now devolved to bloodshed and persecution. During this psychic turmoil, the purifying radiance of the Emperor, the Astronomican, plummeted as if it were a tallow candle guttering in a tumultuous wind. In desperation, many of the Spyrehead conclaves on the planet pooled their resources and delved deeply into crumbling treatises on the nature of astropathic beacons and put into motion a fantastical gambit: fortifying the principle lighthouse in Ravachol as a psychic conduit to amplify the waning Astronomican.

Vastarian: the Smallest Church in Saint-Fauré

Ehret Filipovic, Chief Bibliognost of the Church of the Red Athenæum, with a sister of the Order of the Crimson Hour.

Bill Ford, of the Mordheim 2022 and Rot of Hondious fame, created an amazing game board to represent the interior of a small Imperial chapel for Vastarian, complete with pews and a raised dais. The main board was created primarily with foam, with individual stone tiles created from foam. The walls and flying buttresses are from Pegasus Hobbies 28mm Gothic City Building model kits. Having just received the board, we really wanted to create a narrative framework for the board that would easily allow us to play thematic games at upcoming events, such as Under the Dice Fest at the end of the month! We ended up devising that the chapel is one of the houses of worship for the Church of the Red Athenæum, and current resting place of a significant holy artifact, the Codex Pháros: