Vastarian: Open Invitational Contest

In the later part of 2023, Between the Bolter and Me launched its first major Open Invitational called Vastarian - Dreams of the Pious. Vastarian is a major cathedral world that has been thrown into bloody turmoil due to the opening of the Cicatrix Maledictum, which caused a massive psychic awakening. The invitational is set in this world and encourages anyone to create their own Imperial Cult (the more eccentric and deranged the better) and with your favorite ruleset, play some skirmish games to help develop the lore! We have had a series of posts continuing to develop the setting, including showcasing two factions (the Church of the Red Athenæum and a faction of Spyreheads) and some artwork showing others, as well as writing a battle report within the setting! To our excitement, other hobbyists are already starting to create cults for Vastarian, which can be seen via searching #vastarian on Instagram! To generate additional excitement and get more people involved, we thought it would be fun to run a contest that had people create their own cult, complete with models and some background lore!

Vastarian: The Cults of Vastarian

Vastarian is an open invitational where we are encouraging people to create Imperial Cults that are at war with each other on the cathedral world (Vastarian). While we have shown two cults on the planet (the Church of the Red Athenæum and a faction of Spyreheads), we wanted to do more to give people ideas to create their own Vastarian cults. After some deliberation, we came to the conclusion that some Vastarian artwork would be an ideal way to get peoples’ imaginations flowing. Having worked with Martin McCoy on multiple volumes of 28 magazine, we knew he would excel at creating some concept art for Vastarian. We commissioned him to create a piece of artwork that displayed a host of different cults, to emphasize how eccentric and divergent they can be from one another. Ultimately, Martin created two amazing companion pieces. At the time of writing, you can still get prints of each piece of artwork on his Etsy page!

Vastarian: Rules for the Church of the Red Athenæum

The Church of the Red Athenæum.

Since announcing the Vastarian Open Invitational, we have showcased factions (Church of the Red Athenæum and Spyreheads), revealed the logo, recorded an episode of our podcast, and wrote a battle report. Despite all of this, we have not spoken too much about the rule set we have been using to play our games. In the original post, we suggested that we would primarily be using the 2023 Necromunda rules, but encouraged people to use whatever system they enjoyed and are familiar with. Indeed, we have played a handful of games, mostly using the Necromunda rules. Additionally, we have also played games using Forbidden Psalm, like at the Rot of Hondious event. With this post, we want to show some sample warband lists for different rule systems to give readers a sense of the possibilities for playing games in the Vastarian setting!

Vastarian: Logo update!

Recently we began an open invitational encouraging people to create Imperial Cults that are at war with each other on the cathedral world of Vastarian. We have now shown two of the cults that the planet harbors, the Church of the Red Athenæum and a faction of Spyreheads. We also talked more about how the setting came about on our podcast, Dragged into Turbolasers. Although Adam already designed a basic logo for the event, featuring a lighthouse that has been used as a watermark in most of the Vastarian images, we wanted to also have a text-based logo. When considering this, we quickly thought of the incredibly talented graphic designer and miniature artist Weirding Way. We reached out to him about the project and he agreed to help us! Fitting to the INQ28 theme, he created the logo using a typographic kitbash, scanning letters from a book on early book printing type, with the V being an A modified from an 18 century Norwegian title page!

Vastarian: Spyreheads

A procession of Vastarian Spyreheads.

When thinking about other potential cults for the Vastarian setting, we knew it would not be complete without a sect of Spyreheads! Stygian_thorne created the concept of these enigmatic architecture-wearing pilgrims. The idea was at least partially inspired by a piece of artwork created by the legendary John Blanche for Iron Sleet’s Pilgrym, entitled Ascend the Celestial Stair. We thought a world like Vastarian, which is covered in monolithic houses of worship, would attract devotees to the Emperor and the Arxvs Dedicatvm. We commissioned the iconic Ana Polanšćak of Gardens of Hecate to create the first five Vastarian Spyreheads!

The Rot of Hondious: Red Joy warband

The Road to Recovery is a Dead End Littered with Dead Bodies.

The Rot of Hondious, an Inq28 campaign held at the Rich Grimmond 2023 event, was fantastic. It gave us the opportunity to use Lucretia Barghest, an infected spyrehead, in some games of Forbidden Psalm! Although we had a few posts about her, including one showing how the model was converted, we have not shown the rest of the warband on the blog, and wanted to fix that. Part of the reason we decided to create a Red Joy warband, a host of bloody and mindless degenerates, was that it would give us an opportunity to paint a few eclectic models we recently got, namely a pair of MÖRK BORG goblins from Westfalia Miniatures, and a Bellman sculpted by Ana Polanšćak for the Folk Horrors II Kickstarter. While the models are quite different from each other, their macabre styling fit the concept of a deranged and bloody cult. For the remainder of the warband, we decided to use a selection of eclectic models we acquired over the years. Two were models from Ana’s first Kickstarter, and the final was one of WilhelMiniatures’ Forest Dwellers that I painted last year.

The Rot of Hondious: Lucretia Barghest

Pandemic Containment Collapse.

Lucretia Barghest used to curse getting stuck on the backwater of Hondious. Her glorious pilgrimage to Terra to bask in His radiance stymied by warp storms and the ill-fated rogue trader Mathias Torvald, or was it Sorvald? It didn’t matter. Her convictions were changing. No, not changing. Evolving. Transforming into something that could better celebrate His majesty. Something that could truly stand tall, projecting His magnanimous spirit. And those convictions were not based around walls. Not built around architecture, minarets, nor spires. Everything was so much simpler now, the scriptures of the Arxvs Dedicatvm finally clicked into place. It was not mortar, brick, or ferrocrete that formed the building blocks of the Imperial Faith. It was Flesh. She could hear them calling clearly now. She could hear them discussing it everywhere. Finally, there were no secrets. And what a joyous revelation it all was. Knitting everything together. Or rather everyone together.

The Rot of Hondious: Spyrehead conversion

When all antibiotics become useless.

Later this month, Martin McCoy and Bill Ford are running a narrative Inq28 event called The Rot of Hondious. It centers around a backwater feudal planet largely shunned from the Imperium. Its isolation has escalated into a strict quarantine in the last twenty years as the planet has been wracked by a curious plague. The Red Joy seemingly takes hold of its victims central nervous system, compelling them to dance with joyous abandon, a rictus smile on their face until they collapse dehydrated, blood leaching from their pores. The Inquisition has recently taken an interest in the phenomenon, and the plague has started to become sentient having infected the planet's meager psykic population. We thought it would be fun to create a small Red Joy warband centered around a wayward pilgrim that got stranded on the planet and got infected by the plague. We always wanted to convert a Spyrehead based on Stygian_thorne's concept, and decided this was a great time for it!