Make the Empire Great Again! - Merijn's Imperial Crusade

"There is too much evil!" cried the lord of the realm suddenly. Reindolph startled awake. Bits of the night's feast cascaded from his beard as he sat up.

The province's poor were faced with starvation. After paying their tithe of grain to the church. Their tax of grain to the lord. And their tribute of grain to Reindolph's lodge of knights for their protection, there was little left for the peasants to feed themselves with. Reindolph never understood why they didn't just grow more grain.

 "Choose anything but chaos." his lord continued to lament drunkenly at no one in particular. Reindolph started to grin, he knew where this was going.

Whenever the peasantry started to voice irrational complaints and make unreasonable demands on the province's grain supplies, it was time to illuminate who was really to blame. From across the room, Holbert, the fat, bald priest locked eyes with Reindolph, clearly thinking along the same line of thought.

It was time to burn some heretics. Reindolph idly wondered what heretics look like this year.

Another year, another challenge! It's a bit of a mish-mash this year. I really wanted to paint some of the large Empire mini's I had lying around. The war wagon, the altar of battle, an old steam tank. But honestly, I don't care much for playing those piddly, weak human infantry.

So how do you fill out an army when you don't want to paint too many humies? Knights of course. Big, shiny, expensive, knights. So I quickly came up with the idea of doing a crusade.

Troop wise, the core of the army is a big unit of 14 of the xenophobic Knights Panther led by their lodge master Reindolph. Since joining the chapter, Reindolph has achieved a lot of good for the Empire. For instance, killing foreigners has kept Reindolph far away from his father's business interests.

These buggers are heck to strip. Still working on most of them with a dental pick.

Of course, every crusade needs an angry rabble. That's why 30 flagellants are following Reinhold with fervor. Toughness 4 and unbreakable. I refuse to play baseline cowardly humans! And any rabble needs rabble-rousers, that's why I included a generous smattering of witch hunters and other exemplars of critical thinking. Yes, the paint stripping is ongoing.

Leadership tests are for micromanaging weenies

Aside from my main block of knights, I needed some... lesser knights as a character bunker. War is good money is you can find a safe job. Enter the mounted cooks on cocks.

Cock jokes!

I bet you thought the double entanders... entandredres... dick jokes were over? You can't have a crusade without demonstrating that my religion is bigger than yours. That's why we're bringing a giant gold freedom bird ready to hammer the religion into you until it takes. Thank the faithful for their donations to make this monument to me*cough* Sigmar possible.

We also have a war wagon that will be pulling duty as one of them modern magic cart thingers from the 9th age. What's the point in being rich if you can't show off with a sweet ride?

Finally, we have Hanz and his grain alcohol-fueled conveyance. Hanz is the province's most entrepreneurial inventor and patent holder to such inventions as the Hanz self-propelled grain planter. The Hanz automatic harvester. The Hanz fully mechanical masseuse. And of course, the Hanz grain fermenter that turns grain into fuel for all his automated inventions. Everyone agrees Hanz has done great things for the economic stability of the Hanz family.

Hanz feels his vehicle is exceptionally effective in securing the trade agreements that ensure liberated sovereign nations fairly compensate the crusade for their liberation efforts.

Anyway, that's it for now. The other armies in the challenge this year look absolutely fantastic. Working along with you guys last year has been inspirational. Let's repeat the experience!