Chaos Versus Ogres

I had not played the Ogres yet and was very excited about doing so. Well, okay, I played them in Warbands...but that doesn't count.

First off, Warbands is so limiting that you don't get a real feeling for what troops can do. For example, Tomb Kings desperately need mass Magic to be effective. In Warbands, the simply can't have it.

Second, armies that are small numbers are disproportionately punished in Warbands for bad rolls. If you only have 2 guys and one bad roll means one of them dies...well, every so often you are going to have a bad roll. There is no margin for error in Warbands.

So anyway, I was really looking forward to this game. Ogres have the strength to be a threat to Chaos, they have the toughness to take a lot of damage and with multiple wounds, they can strike back more frequently than a lot of armies. Plus, there is something vaguely disquieting about attacking a small unit of 4 models, wounding 16 times, and seeing half the unit stil standing there....

Of course, they also struggle to hit striking back due to their low weapon skill, they have such limited armor that they take wounds anytime they are wounded, and their missile range is pretty limited. (I mistakenly thought it was 12" except for the Hunter...turns out the Maneaters have 24" range).

So the potential is there for some epic close combat encounters.

I got a wild hair Friday night and decided to try gluing the Dragon Ogre Shaggoth without pinning, so a last-minute adjustment to my army was needed. Fortunately, Kev is an easy going guy, so the adjustment was simple; we each added 265 points to our armies which let me fit him in...well, okay, I gave him an extra hand weapon, so 275 points.

We rolled and I ended up with a 2000 point and he a 1500 point army. I think if it had been the reverse, I would have lived with it but A) the poor Ogres have yet to win a game and B) I did not want to Massacre him in a game where he had no chance which I probably would have done in that case...unless we altered the scenario to something like Ambush which actually just occurred to me when I typed that.

Oh well.

We really wanted to go a game under Lord-level characters, so we settled on 1750+265.

I went with the 1750 point list from this post and added the Shaggoth. Good times.

Goals:

1) Get off a charge with the Knights

2) Win a challenge that allows me to roll on the Eye table

3) Do some damage with the Shaggoth

THE SET-UP

The terrain was interesting. On both sides we had hills, a small stream entered and left the field about the center on one flank, and there was another stream in one deployment zone. He won the roll for table edge and took the side he was standing on. I had to deploy first.

I had a simple plan: group my units of Warriors in the center, my Knights on the flanks, and my Battle Standard Bearer in the center, ideally within 6" of all of them so my entire army would be Stubborn leadership 8, giving them an 89% chance of passing any test.

So the first unit I placed was a unit of Warriors in the valley between the hills. He placed his Leadbelchers opposite them. I placed my other unit of Warriors a bit to their right...and realized I had already made a mistake.

I would have at least 2 units outside of range of my Battle Standard Bearer if I put the Knights on the flanks as planned. And I knew he had a Gut Magic spell that forces me to take Leadership tests and a magic item he could take that made those tests -3. So that could really hurt.

Anyway, I put a unit of Knights outside each unit of Warriors and the Shaggoth in the hole between them. The Battle Standard Bearer went behind the Shaggoth and my General joined the Knights on the right since he was loading up his left flank with Bull units. He had Maneaters in teh center, Gnoblars everywhere and a Scraplauncher. I did NOT see that coming. Fortunately, I had Wulfrik, 16 Marauders and they could enter from any table edge at some point.

OGRE TURN 1

I won the roll and chose to have him go first. I thought the max range he had was the Leadbelchers at 12" and as a result, I thought the entire battle would be fought from 12" or less (except the Scraplauncher).

Well, if he is within 12",I am within charge range with my Knights and Shaggoth, and not far removed from the Warriors charging as well. Therefore, having him move first meant I might have a first-turn charge.

He moved about everyone forward.

He cast the Gut Magic Spell that added Regeneration to a unit of Bulls on my right flank. Not good. My Dispel failed.

He then tried some other random spell but failed to cast it.

Then came my first shock: His Maneaters had 24" range and were able to shoot at my Warriors. No damage done.

His Scraplauncher had no Line of Sight.

Chaos Turn 1

I had deployed over an inch behind my center line which meant I was out of charge range.On the bright (?) side, Wulfric rolled on!

I was not ready for him yet. I wanted him to come on when Kev was engaged in hand to hand so I could flank or rear charge him. Now I had a choice: I could come on my right flank under cover of the stream to threaten his flank. That, however, would mean I was across the field from his General, which was Wulfrik's target.

Alternatively, I could come on behind his Scraplauncher to take it out. Again...I would be BEHIND the General and moving 4-8" a turn, probably never catch him moving 6-12".

His Yehtees on the hill meant I was in danger if I came on that flank, but I thought I could protect against the flank charge so entered a little less than half way on my left flank which allowed me to threaten his General unit. (Is it just me, or do I sound like I have studied too many chess games? 'He moves B2 to K4, threatening p3-p4, Q-R8 check, Kk5-Q1, KB1-K1 Mate)

My Knights on the right performed a slight retrograde allowing them to face the 2 or 3 units of Bulls coming over the hill. My left flank Knights moved to charge the Yehtees should they charge my Marauders.

Ogre Turn 2

His rear-most Gnoblars bickered. No big deal, they were blocked out of the action. He moved his Bulls on my right flank up to the top of the hill, a unit behind them, and his Butcher to their flank.

I THINK this is the turn his Gorger arrived.

He advanced up the middle with other troops but the Yehtees proved too far away to charge.

His Maneaters opened fire but again failed to wound any Warriors.

Then came Episode 493 in Warhammer things I find funny. His most effective units got into the action as the Scraplauncher killed a Marauder. First blood to...the Gnoblars?

Seriously? I have Chaos Warrios, Chaos Knights, a Dragon Ogre Shaggoth, an Exalted Hero, Wulfrik...Kev has Maneaters, a Tyrant, Leadbelchers, Yehtees...and the GNOBLARS draw first blood? Whatever.

It was pretty funny.

His magic phase gave +1 Strength to the back-up unit of Bulls on his left (my right) flank.

Chaos Turn 2

My plan worked to perfection. He was in range of mass charges. My Wulfrik-led Marauders charged his Leadbelchers in the flank. My Knights on the right flank charged his Bulls on the hill. My Shaggoth charged his Maneaters. My Warriors charged some Gnoblars maybe?

Well...ALMOST perfection. He did the one thing I did not anticipate...he fled his Leadbelchers.

I actually agree with the decision. He got no stand and shoot, I had Wulfrik and 2 extran ranks of Marauders hitting him in the flank, the failed charge meant he would flank charge with the Yehtees and frontal charge me with his Tyrant and Ironguts. He would PROBABLY rally with the Leadbelchers in the center of the field.

Well, anyway I moved my Battle Standard on top of the left hill so he would be within 6" of the Marauders and turned my left Chaos Warriors to face his Gorger. My Knights moved to get out of the gorgers line of sight.

On the right flank, my Frenzied Knights went to work. 16 attacks needing 3s to hit and then 3 to wound. Sweet, 10 wounds! Nothing to complain about there!!!!

Until he Regenerated 6 of them. Wow, already his less than 100 point Wizard has been more valuable than entire magic-based armies I have used before with over 1000 points invested in making magic powerful.

He then had just 9 attacks back wounded me twice. Needing 2s to save...I failed one. Awesome. I need worse saves so I can save 60% :-)

I still won the battle handily: 4 wounds + outnumber + Battle Standard to 1 wound + he needs insane courage. He did not get it, but his flee bounced through the second unit of Bulls whom I then hit...bypassing his Butcher and I think yet another unit of Bulls who would have had a charge if I was still atop the hill. All in all, that combat went better than could have been drawn up for me.

My Shaggoth went to work. With 2 hand weapons, he had a massive 6 attacks. 5 hit. 3 wounded. A Maneater died. Then the other Maneater wounded me back 3 times. At first we thought it meant a drawn combat but then realized the Shaggoth had unit strength 6, not 3, so I outnumbered him. His Stubborn Maneater then failed his test, broke and ran.

I caught him...and ended up right in front of the fleeing Leadbelchers. Hmm.

I think this was when my Warriors charged in, devastated his Gnoblars, but I don't remember. All in all, awesome turn for me.

Ogre Turn 3

His Yehtees did indeed flank charge my Marauders and then he made what, in retrospect, might have been a mistake. He charged his Tyrant-led Ironguts into the front.

Which meant Wulfrik could fight. And could challenge his Tyrant who, per Hunter of Men, could not refuse.

His Gorger charged my Warriors.

His Leadbelchers rallied. His fleeing Bulls...on my Shaggoth's right, but out of line of sight....also rallied. Uh-oh...

The Yehtees were awesome, slaying 3 or 4 Marauders. The Bull Charge killed a couple more. His regular Bulls killed one or two.

And Wulfrik, who consistently has underperformed, dying without wounding, went to work on the Tyrant. He saved both wounds, then went and wounded the Tyrant 4 times...who could save just one and, having taken a wound for some armor prior to the battle, he one-turn killed him! Yes!

I instantly said, "I forfeit, Kev wins via Massacre." I was really excited. About time something I looked forward to playing performed to expectations.

I finally got to roll on the table! I got a +1 to my armor, making Wulfrik better yet.

Still, I lost the combat by a handful. Fortunately, I was within 6" of the Battle Standard Bearer and passed my test, being Stubborn thanks to the Banner of Chaos (my own slight renaming).

Over on the other flank, it was more of the same. I had the charge, slew a couple Bulls, took no damage in return, he fled, I pursued...right to a couple inches short of his freshly rallied Bulls.

Meanwhile, his Gorger benefited from my "must declare a challenge" rule. Since he was alone, he could not deny it. Therefore, instead of having 3 Frenzied guys attacking, I had one...who, after taking 2 wounds, did not get to attack at all.

I still won the combat with rank bonus, outnumbering, and banner, but since the Gorger is Unbreakable, it did not matter. I would have to actually slay him to win. Good luck with that, let me know how it turns out.

Chaos Turn 4

Okay, my priority here is pretty simple. I need to make sure my Shaggoth doesn't get shot. Simple solution? Remember the Gnoblars that bickered? Perfect charge target. Here I go!

My left flank Knights charged his Yehtees. My Battle Standard Bearer could rear-charge his Leadbelchers or flank-charge his Ironguts. Since I would be outnumbered and not remove his bonuses, I went after the Ironguts.

So that was an intriguing combat; My Battle Standard Bearer was flanking his Ironguts who were frontally committed against the Marauders who were flanked by the Yehtees who were facing the Knights. Awesome.

The Knights killed 2 Yehtees and hurt the third, a Marauder wounded a Bull, Wulfrik killed a Bull, the Battle Standard Bearer killed a Bull. He could only kill one Marauder in return, he broke all over the place, my Marauders ran down his Ironguts, my Knights ran down his Yehtees.

I also, being under Frenzy, had to charge his Bulls. I killed one or two, he fled, I over-ran not only him but the other fleeing unit of Bulls. I had now taken out that entire flank except one unit of Bulls and the Butcher with one unit of Knights bolstered by my Exalted Hero General.

The Shaggoth slew 5 Gnoblars, but their rank bonus and outnumbering meant it was a drawn combat. Whatever. Run, you little nits!

With a nice 9 attacks needing 3s, I flailed away at the Gorger. I did not wound him even once. He killed 2 Warriors. I won the combat with static combat resolution. He laughed and decided to stick around for another round.

Ogre Turn 4

His Scraplauncher charged my Warriors. His Bulls began crossing my deployment zone towards my Warriors hissy-fit fighting the Gorger, supported by his Butcher. His Leadbelchers advanced towards my rampaging Knights.

The scraplauncher slew a couple Warriors, but my BSB meant they were stubborn. I rolled a 9...but they were close enough to the BSB to re-roll and passed. Every roll going my way.

The Leadbelchers finally opened fire. Something like 18 or 20 shots. 4 wounds. 2 not saved. I lost 2 of my Knights, finally giving him over 50% for them.

I killed 5 more Gnoblars and this time they fled the Shaggoth who chose not to pursue.

Again, I swung 9 times and this time 6 hit. That is better. 6 hits needing 5s...should do a wound or two. But whiffed completely with not one roll over a 4. His Gorger killed another Warrior or so and was eating away at my advantage.

Chaos Turn 4

I turned my Knights to face his Leadbelchers, turned my Shaggoth to get behind them, moved my Marauders and BSB to pin them down.

My other Knights started heading towards his Gorger/Bulls.

Only one close combat right now: the famous Gorger. And something weird happened this turn; I got a wound on him!

It only took 27 rolls needing a 3 followed by 5. I should have done slightly less than 6 wounds by this point and had done one. Hmm.

He, of course, killed another Warrior.

Ogre Turn 5

His Leadbelchers charged my Exalted Hero/Knights on my right flank. His Bulls moved towards my engaged Warriors. His Butcher moved forward.

I won the combat. His Leadbelchers broke and died.

The Gorger slew another Warrior.

Chaos Turn 5

Not much to do but get the Knights on my left close enough to MAYBE save my Warriors and seize table quarters. Oh, and charge into his Scraplauncher with Wulfrik and company who promptly did enough wounds to cause his Scraplauncher to break and I over ran it.

No wounds by the Gorger this turn.

Ogre turn 6

His Bulls got the rear-charge. They were too close to Bull charge, but killed 2 warriors. And with the least attacks I had on him all game, my last 2 Warriors killed the Gorger at long last. Inspired by their great feat....they promptly failed their break test and fled off the table. He pursued right off the table which meant he had exactly one model left on the table.

Chaos Turn 6

I charged his Butcher with my Knights and BSB, a tremendously stupid move.

See, I MUST declare a challenge. If he rolls well and I roll poorly, he could kill by BSB and all the combat resolution in the world won't save me. Fortunately, my BSB won the duel and took bloody revenge for him hacking down my warriors. It was a decisive revenge.

ROUND-Up

Okay, the Knights ROCKED this battle. One unit punched up with an Exalted Hero single-handed wrecked an entire flank. I destroyed 2 units of Bulls and a Leadbelcher.

Furthermore, when I destroyed the units, it led to fortuitous movement that took me out of range of units he had well-set up to flank charge me if I were held up for even a single turn. So I was very fortunate in that regard.

Getting the charge on his Maneaters allowed the Shaggoth to win a combat he probaby would have lost otherwise since just one of them was able to wound him THREE times. Of course, the Maneaters had to have been disappointing to Kev as they took I believe 12 shots without ever doing a wound.

The Marauders were good at protecting Wulfrik ad letting him actually do what he does best. IN combination with a BSB keeping them in the fight regardless of casualties, they were able to survive 12 casualties to deliver my killing machine to the places he needed to be.

It was cool rolling on the table even though the result was one I ended up never taking advantage of...but that is okay I was super happy to roll on the table.

The Battle Standard Bearer w/Banner proved well worth his points, even if he did not "do" the points worth. He kept my Marauders and Wulfrik around long enough for my Knights to arrive and take care of the Yehtees. He kept my Warriors alive long enough for Wulfrik to arrive and slay the Scraplauncher. All in all, he contended with Wulfrk and my Knights for MVP.

The Shaggoth did everything I wanted him to. He got into combat, did some damage, and generally controlled the center of the field.

Only the Warriors did not meet or exceed expectations. Taking I believe it was 5 turns to kill the Gorger was really, really pathetic. Of course, I was playing them wrong.

I thought I took the version with Khorne and...I am not sure what. I played them with that Mark and no upgrades. They should have been striking last with no Frenzy but with Strength 6. Instead, I had them striking first with Frenzy and with S4...but no other upgrade. Oops.

Still, Math Hammer suggest 27 swings should be good for 17.82 hits. 17 hits needing 5s to hit is good for 5.88 wounds. In other words, 3 - 4 turns at the outside should have been plenty. The extra turns were tough and ended up costing them their lives.

I would say this battle confirms a couple things. Needing 4s to hit, it was just too hard for the Ogres to get damage through.

As for my goals:

1) Epic success. The right flank Knights charged almost every turn except the first and 5th I think. The Knights on the left only got off two charges, but both led to Ogre disaster.

2) Wulfrik did the deed and got the roll. I am happy now.

3) Oh, yeah, the Shaggoth rolled. He destroyed a unit of Maneaters and a unit of Gnoblars. He did 11 actual casualties...1 Maneater and 10 Gnoblars. This is the type of result I was hoping for.

He is a fun model and I look forward to painting him.

The traditional "We won and survived" Photo op.

Overall, it was a pretty fun game. I think some tactical choices by Kev slanted the battle in my favor; he knew my Knights would have Khorne, so with a bit of patience, he could have forced me to charge Gnoblars with my Knights and, knowing I was likely to overrun them, set up one unit of Bulls to accept the charge and another one (or two) to counter-charge my flanks. That would have given him a starting static combat resolution of +2 (+1 for flank, +1 for outnumber) while removing my Battle Standard bonus and given him at least a chance. He had enough units to do that on one flank.

Then again, that is a trap that takes a lot of patience to put together and with the hill placement, it might have taken 2 more turns to set up. With my Shaggoth and Warriors advancing up the middle and my left flank having spare Knights, he might not have had time.

The Scraplauncher only fired 1 time, the Leadbelchers did not fire until the game was over, and that worked out in my favor.

Chaos Versus Brettonia, 2000 points

I knew going in that Liam is pretty new to the game but, from what I have seen, a fast learner. So I tried to build an army that would be fun for me to play, have a chance to win, but hopefully draw or lose by Marginal Victory.

I set my goals early; 

1) Win a Challenge to roll on the Eye table

2) Get a charge with my Chaos Knights

3) Get some magic off

4) lose by Marginal Victory or achieve a draw.

I went with another unusual army for me. My well-known despising of Marauders is particularly hilarious in light of my taking a unit of 20 of them, all that I have...and in an even bigger departure from my typical army building, I used some left-over points to give them a standard bearer and musician. No champion, 2 points short of having enough.

The idea was for them to join Wulfric and go after the field Trebuchet I expected to see. Their entire purpose was to provide a +4 static combat resolution. Knowing I will pretty much always hit on a 4 and wound on at best a 4, I know the odds of me doing more than 1 wound per turn (assuming I go 5 wide to get the 3 rank bonus and include Wulfrik in the front rank, displacing a peon:I will thus have 4 attacks if I charge, I have WS4 which the only unit I have ever seen them have a better WS than is the Skinks...so as a general rule, they hit on 4s. With S3, facing T3 again, I need 4s. So if the opponent has no save, my 4 attacks figure to average one wound per turn in the long run. I am not going to count on them doing any damage since I have yet to run into a unit that has no save.

I also took an Exalted Hero with the Battle Standard and Banner of the gods. It makes him cause Terror and, more importantly, allows units within 6" of him to test as if Stubborn. Intending to more or less Castle and let my Chaos Warriors absorb the charge, figuring to have two shots to not break at 8-, I should break just about 11% of the time. That should handle anything but complete obliteration of my "anvil" units...2 12 man Chaos Warrior blocks with full commands. One I gave the Banner of Wrath, a Magic Missile I forgot all 6 turns, and the other the War Banner  to give them +1 combat resolution which I promptly forgot in the one combat they were involved in. Well-spent points, those banners....

I took one unit of Chaos Knights with full command and Banner of Rage to give them Frenzy.

That left me about 550 points and no way to deal with flying death machines. I wanted to put in a Dragon Ogre Shaggoth, a couple of Chaos Spawn and my Chaos Prince. The Prince was vital. I had the model, it looks awesome, he flies, and, being stubborn, should be able to handle any monster for at least a turn or two. 

Then I randomly decided to make him a Sorcerer of Tzeentch. I ramped him up to Level 4, gave him the mark, and there was 535 points. No room for the Shaggoth or Spawn. Since I was only putting the spawn in since I think they are sub-par, going with Magic which, as we all know, has hurt me far more than helped me, meant I would still be going sub-par and by not taking the Shaggoth, which I still believe will be an excellent troop choice, it gave me a small, compact, fragile army that could do some real damage. 

Having the Chaos Warriors and just 5 Knights meant I would have a slow-moving army. How the field looked would make a huge difference.

We ended up with a tower and  river blocking one edge, a village on the other, and another tower close to the village. The center of the field would be wide open. He won the roll for choosing side and took the more open side which meant I would have a very crowded deployment zone. He then won the roll to see who would set up first. 

I put my first unit of Chaos Warriors, the ones with the Banner of Wrath, on my left flank well forward in my deployment zone. I anchored their left flank against the village. He placed his Men at Arms (Fast Cavalry) in a screening formation at the front of his zone. I placed my other unit of Warriors with their right flank anchored on the tower on my right flank. He dropped Knights of the Realm on what would be my left flank behind the screen. I put my Knights slightly behind the rows of Warriors and in the center. I should be able to lure him in, use by BSB (Battle Standard Bearer) to make my anvils stubborn and use my Knights to flank him once he was engaged. He then placed his Grail Knights (GK) in the center of his army. I put my BSB in the Knights and the Prince behind my left-flank warriors. He placed another Knights of the Realm (KOR) on in the formation behind the screen and then his Pegasus knights and his general on Griffin on my extreme left flank.

Rules Error

We rolled for going first but still gave him the Blessing. Oops. Should have been auto-my turn. Oh well, no harm done.

I actually won the roll and debated for a few moments. I could already see from his army composition and  deployment that he has improved by leaps and bounds. That means if I let him get the charge with his GK on my Chaos Knights, I would never get to attack back and would lose by massacre. So I wanted him to advance. I gave him first turn.

Brettonian Turn 1

He flew his Pegasus Knights and Griffin-riding general up my left flank. Nothing else moved. No shooting, no magic.

Chaos Turn 1

Uh-oh. That means I will have him flying up my backside or flank if I advance. On the bright side, I rolled a "6" and Wulfrik arrived with his Marauders. I brought him in behind the General (who was his "victim" per Hunter of Men), turned my Warriors and Knights and moved them back to prevent the rear or flank charge. Then I flew my Prince on top of my left-flank tower. Time to open up a can of Magic. Cast Infernal Gateway, arguably the  most powerful spell in the game (though seeing what Fullur did next to me with whatever he was using...Ruination of Cities maybe? I might argue that one is far and away THE MOST POWERFUL SPELL IN THE GAME HANDS DOWN, its saving grace being two-fold:ridiculous casting cost and belonging only to one special character).

I cast it at his General. Really did not want that monster flying into my units. Did 5 hits at S9. Bwooohahaha, some good stuff happening here! 2 hits were assigned to the griffin and 3 to the General. General then used his 2+ Ward Save and re-roll failed Armor Saves combo to save all 3 of them. Rules Error. We later discovered that Ward Save was a 1-use only so it is possible had he used the 5+ Ward from the Blessing I might have done a wound or two. As it was, knowing his General had a 2+ Ward save, it really removed any interest I had in attacking his General since he was the definition of effectively unkillable. Why waste resources on something you cannot hurt?

On the bright side, the two assigned to the Griffin needed just 2s to wound...and I promptly rolled a 1. On the brighter side, he failed his 5+ Ward save so I did a wound to the Griffin. I was actually happy with that.  He then dispelled my Flickering Fire.

Brettonian Turn 2

He now flew his Flying Circus of 5 Pegasus Knights and (separate) his General to the back center of my deployment zone. Here is where he made his biggest mistake of the game. He again did not move his other units. Even if he gave me the charge, the best I could do would be hit his Men at Arms which would, even if they broke, mean I then charged his GK and KOR units. Since I could not start fighting them until the following turn, that would mean he could rear-charge me with his Terror causing Griffon. Not a place I want my Knights to be: outnumbered by units with a ++8 combat resolution with his un-touchable General and Griffin attacking before I could attack his GK.  Fortunately, he did not move them forward.

Chaos Turn 2

I turned my C-Warriors and Knights and moved them towards his Flying Circus, started rolling my Marauders around the tower to prepare to flank charge his castle whenever they started to move. 

I then Mis-Cast with Infernal Gateway. Playing error:I took the rather expensive but Powerful Chaos Gift Tendrils of Tzeentch which allows me to re-roll any one die which, per the description, can prevent a mis-cast. I should have picked up one of the 2 "1s" I rolled and had a 5 in 6 chance of casting the spell successfully. Fortunately, I rolled a 5 and the only harm was he could instantly cast a spell automatically. He had no spell casters. No real damage done.

Brettonian Turn 3

One turn too late, he began slowly advancing. He moved his flying circus to my far left flank, out of my charge arc.

Chaos Turn 3

This was becoming a battle of maneuver rather than combat. First huge mistake would probably win or lose it. I flew my Prince to the top of the left tower so I could charge his Flying Circus, moved my Warriors and Knights to support each other and protect their flanks. 

Infernal Gateway on the Grail Knights. Something like 7 hits with S 5 or 6. Hey, magic might be pretty good! He needed to save 5. 2 he saved with Armor save. No problem, 3 shots only needing to get past his 5+ Ward Save and I would remove his Rank Bonus if even one fell. Problem is...he rolled 2 5s and a 6. No damage. Grr. Stupid magic. 

Brettonian Turn 4

His General flew to the left flank behind the tower which would provide me an interesting choice. His castle formation did not move but for the first time in the game had range. He fired with his Men at Arms and shot down a Chaos Warrior. Stupid rolling 1s to save. Agh. By the way...this was the first casualty of the game. Yeah, I did one wound to the Griffin, but this was the first death. In turn 4. Hmm.

Chaos Turn 4

If his General did not have that stupid 2+ Ward Save, I would charge him with my Prince and Wulfrik would be on him next turn (assuming I could survive a round and pass my LD test). But knowing I had no chance to wound him, that seemed pointless. 

So I moved my Marauders forward thinking I would be out of L.O.S. of his General and other units.

Also, I wanted to play well but not great. So I announced, "I am going to deliberately make a mistake here." I then announced a charge on his Men at Arms with my Prince. That would give him the flank charge if his troops miraculously held or if I rolled poorly to pursue or if he fled.  I debated charging the KOR since I would only start at a -2 or -3, but I did not think I could kill 3+ KOR. 

Being Fast Cavalry he elected to flee but rolled poorly and I caught him and destroyed him. Since they are peasants, they caused none of the tests I thought they would force his KOR to take. Oops. 

Well, I had a choice; keep targeting the Grail Knights or try to reduce the force I was about to get hit with since two units of KOR had line of sight and probably charge arcs. So I cast Infernal Gateway at the closest KOR. Got a whopping 9 hits at S6. And I had one of those rolls you dream about...no 1s! Yes! Well, 2 of his 9 saved, then the Ward Save let 4 more save (yep, 50% saved needing 5s. Good times.) Still, I killed 3! The most damage I have accomplished with Magic. I was pretty happy with that, though not as happy as I would have been had he failed hi break test. As usual, he dispelled my Flickering Fire.

Brettonian Turn 5

Time to do what they do best. Charge! General charges the Marauders..being a Large Target he probably had L.O.S. I also let him use the Pegasus Knights (which were on the far side of the tower) to charge. I did not think they had LOS but I think it made the game more fun for him. Also, I pretty much figured my Marauders would be exiting soon anyway, why not make it spectacular?

His General accepted Wulfrik's Challenge. Uh...yay? I would be facing a guy re-rolling 2+ Ward Saves. 

Rules Error: Wulfrik was not legal to offer or accept a challenge. He was not in base to base contact with any enemy. *sigh* And it would matter. 

He also used the 2 KOR to charge my Prince. 

Wulfrik took one wound and in return did 3 wounds to the Griffin, killing it. (oops, he should not have been FIGHTING the Griffin....). 5 Marauders also died. Somehow, some way, I passed my break test.

Meanwhile, the Prince declared a challenge and the KOR champ accepted it. He was unable to hit the Prince who killed him in return. Yes, a kill in a challenge! Oh, wait...unit champ, no roll on the worthless Eye table. Being stubborn, I passed my test.

Chaos Turn 5

I moved into position to charge his Pegasus Knights with my Warriors and Knights on the left flank and my Warriors up to support the Prince on the right flank.

Infernal Gateway to the Grail Knights. Another mis-cast. This time I remembered the Tendrils and changed it to a pass. Actually killed 3 and another when Flickering Fire passed! Awesome. Far and away my best magic game. And it was doing some damage, but nothing game-breaking. Sweet. 

Prince struck another champion in a challenge, wounded 4 times and, needing 5+ to save...he saved all 4. Whatever. In return he wounded me once. Needing a 4+ to save...I took a wound. Time to add injury to insult...my Prince rolled a 10. He broke. He would be pursued by 2 units rolling 3d6. I rolled a rather pedestrian 8. His unit on my left rolled...a 6. Safe. His unit on my right rolled...an 11. Oh, smurf. Wait! He runs into my Chaos Warriors! My Prince lives!

On the other flank, Wulfrik can't get through the Ward Save (and can barely even get TO the Ward Save, wounding just once), Marauders die in droves, flee, chased down, wiped out. I said it after the first game; despite his great stat line, Wulfrik is not all that good. I stand by it. Then again...had we not been facing a stronger-than-reality Ward Save, he might have done better. Or had help in the form of the Prince. So maybe he is just having a rough patch, kind of like Dragon Ogre Shaggoths, Wardancers, and magic up until this game.

Brettonian Turn 6

Charge! His Grail Knights charge my Chaos Warriors. His General and Pegasus Knights had no LOS so pretty much did nothing except seize a table quarter. His KOR had to choose between charging my fleeing Prince, my Chaos Knights, or flank charging the Chaos Warriors. If they were not stubborn due to my BSB the Warriors might have been the right choice...but I suspect he should have charged my Prince. I only had a 2 or 3" lead on him, about 10-14" from the table edge...he was worth more than the Chaos Warriors. But that is from my standpoint so who knows what he should have done. I know I would have charged the Prince....but that is just me.

He did real well in the combat, killing 6 Warriors leaving me just 5. Being Stubborn did not help as much as the BSB being there close by to let them re-roll the failed Break test. They stood firm. 

On the other flank, my Warriors did much better; they did a casualty in the challenge without taking one in return. He had a rank bonus of 2, I. had rank bonus of 1. He had a standard as did I. I outnumbered him and had +1  from the War Banner. I broke his KOR. 

What? Finally, Warriors who performed as expected! They usually just die. I seldom do wounds with "the best infantry in the game". In fact, this game was the first one in quite some time  where they did a casualty and the first one in even longer since they did not break. Against the Dark Elf army they ran in one turn, against the Brets last game they ran in one turn...and both times I started with Rank Bonus of 3, a Battle Standard and musician. This time I started with a rank bonus of just 1. How ironic.

The only other close combat I have ever won in a real game (I don't count Warbands) with Chaos Warriors was one I should have auto-lost but my opponent made a mistake. He had the combat won automatically with a flank charge but accidentally front charged me with casualties...err, Skinks and I did so many casualties to them that I won a combat he would have won had he simply not entered the skinks. 

But this was a legitimate combat win against charging Knights of the Realm. I am extremely happy about that. I have been quite unimpressed with them up to this point. But that was impressive.

Chaos Turn 6

The Knights announced a flank charge on his KOR that were flank-charging my Chaos Warriors. My Prince....passed his test! He would live!

His KOR failed their Terror test. Sadly, that was about the worst outcome for me. I needed them there for my charge. I would more than likely kill several of them with my charge and Frenzied bundle of attacks. That would give me a long-shot chance to win the combat and break his Grail Knights. Obviously no guarantee, but that was my best chance. 

I cast Infernal Gateway at his Pegasus Knights but could do no damage. His Grail Knights and Battle Standard bearer, bereft of their S6 charge, hampered by the Mark of Nurgle, struggled to hit my Warriors and those they hit saved. I could not wound him back except for one Knight Errant. He won the combat, I passed my Break test, game over. Time to total the points.

Win or Lose?

Wulfrik is worth 185 points. The Marauders were worth 92 points. He did over half damage to my Stubborn Warrior unit for another 149. He had no table Quarters. 

He scored just 426 points, though actually, in a game of Maneuver, that is not bad. The game really only lasted 2 turns as the first 4 turns were spent battling for position.

Meanwhile, I killed his Griffon for 200 points. I killed his Men at Arms for 135 points. I killed a unit of Knights of the Realm for 193 points. I also owned 2 table quarters. I did not even do half damage to any other unit.

728 points. I won by 302 points, in a 2000 point game a Marginal Victory. Take away the table quarters and it would have been a draw.

Recap

So what happened? Several key moments decided this game. The first one was his not moving his formation forward in turn 2 to put me in a ticklish predicament where no matter what I would be facing a charge from the rear by Pegasus Knights and a Griffon-riding General or by 2 or 3 units of Knights of the Realm and Grail Knights. 

Second, not knowing the Ward Save only worked once seriously altered the game. I would have scored a couple wounds with the Infernal Gateway, known I could actually hurt him, attacked his General with my Prince which most likely would have allowed me to charge his General with my Marauders and Wulfrik.

With a Static Combat Resolution of +3 for rank, 1 for outnumbering, 1 for standard, I am starting ahead by 5. If Griffons have flanks and rear, add +1 or 2 to that. I might have broken his General and killed him, freeing up Wulfric and my own Prince to go after some of his fringe KOR units and frankly I am not worried about the skirmishing Pegasus Knights. I would let them alone get the charge on me so it would have been a much more combat-oriented game.

At the same time, illegally allowing Wulfric to fight his Griffin also had a serious impact. If he is still mobile thanks to his Griffin then his General could cause me a lot of issues. Not to mention saving him 200 points...which again puts us right back to a draw. 

Third, had he charged my Prince instead of charging the Warriors, I think he would have won a marginal victory. He would have scored another 535 points as there is probably about a 95% chance my Prince would have been caught or fled the table barring a roll like the one Fullur and Fixed Dice had...Fullur rolled 3 1s on 3d6 to pursue a Hydra...who promptly rolled a 2 and 1 to get caught. Epic fail, epicly hilarious. 

Anyway, he kills the Prince and most likely won't be in line of sight of my Knights, leaving only one charge possible; my BSB against the Pegasus Knights. This will also cost me a table quarter because my Knights then are in a contested quarter leaving only the quarter for my Warriors to take. Furthermore, that means I do NOT get the 193 for killing his KOR. 

Lets do a hypothetical figure there:

185 for Wulfrik

92 for Marauders

149 for Warriors

535 for Prince: 961 points

I score:

200 for Griffin

135 for the Men at Arms

100 for table quarter

535 points.

He wins by 426, a Marginal Victory...exactly what I was sort of hoping for. 

As we can see, seemingly minor decisions make huge impacts. Any number of things could have seriously altered the outcome of this battle. A roll here or there (like when he made me re-roll all my successful armor saves and instead of saving 4 of 5 needing 2s, I saved none of 5) could have made a huge difference as combats had the outcome reversed. His General might have died early. My Prince could have been (and would have been) over run had I not moved my Warriors forward the full 4".

I loved this battle. For most of it, it looked like he might be able to maneuver me into a corner and get charges on the units he wanted to hit, but I was able to work out of it and force him to hit the unit I wanted him to charge. 

And my intentional bad play of charging the Prince in front of his castle had as good an outcome as it possibly could. If I broke a turn earlier or he ran me down, the game is very, very different.

I said after our first game I expect some epic Bret-Chaos clashes. This game just accentuates that.

I also learned conclusively a couple things.

Seeing all his flying units, I probably should have done something different with my set-up. On the one hand, I like my use of the village and tower to anchor my flanks. On the dark side, I probably should have been more aggressive at inducing the charge from his Knights earlier. My Knights never did get an opportunity to get into combat in anything resembling a favorable position. 

Flying is so lethal to my armies that I essentially have no way to deal with it if it can get behind me. That will seriously affect my deployment and army composition in the future. Maybe I was spoiled by the maneuverability of the Wood Elf army but the Chaos army is just too slow. 

I would say the Spawn, being Unbreakable, would be one powerful answer. Except they are so fragile. The only possible save is Mark of Tzeentch, giving me a 16% chance to save. Not very good. Plus they have to move every turn, so they won't be where I want them to be. A Shaggoth could probably do a reasonable job of anchoring one flank, but the one time I have used one so far, he was pretty fragile as well. So flying units, shooting armies, magic, and monster-based armies are 4 armies that will start every battle with a better-than-average chance of defeating me quite handily. 

So lets see how I did on my goals.

1) Nope. Never won a challenge with anyone who could roll. In fact, the only challenge where I COULD roll saw Wulfrik summarily dismissed.

2) Well...sort of. They fled, so I never got into close combat which is what I actually meant so I will call this a fail, though not the Epic Fail that goal 1 was.

3) This was a massive success. Nothing game-changing..in fact, I did not score any points but I did actually get some spells cast successfully and did a few random casualties. Even though I did nowhere near the points value of the 175ish points I spent to give him Level 4 and the Mark of Tzeentch, it was fun actually getting spells cast and doing damage. The fact it had no real impact on the game is an added bonus. Call this one an epic success.

4) I am okay with a Marginal Victory, especially since if you remove the table quarters I seized on the last turn it was a draw. I could not help the one table quarter since my Warriors were so far from his Knights, but I could have avoided the other and wish I had. So call this a qualified success.

A very nice day.

Warhammer Wars for Saturday, June 13, 2009

Fellow Warmongers,
We shall once again engage in battle upon a field of battle, a "battle-field", if you will; on Saturday, June 13, 2009, at say.... 10 A.M. (so probably actually begin at 11, with the intent to finish before Tim's graduation party). It shall be at the Kennithian fields in Saint Helens, Oregon. Because it seems likely that the grudge-writing ownership-recording goodish people of Campaignsville will be absent, it will not likely be written in the campaign books. If that is the case, it shall be Fuller's Lizardmen of Green Pouponsville vs. the Proud and Wonderful, Honorable Dark Elves of Kennithia in a 2500 point battle to the pain. As should be the case, the taint of Chaos will be evident in a 2500 point battle ready army, as well as a possible smaller detachment if the case calls for it (perhaps a 1-1.5k battle if preferred by his opponent?). As for the Ogres of Snotsville, the Cristened Vampires of Crisonia, the non-hetero elves of Hookahsville, near Rick City, the Orcs and Gobbos of Whoeverwantstousethemismasichisticallyinsane, the Dwarves of Stumpy's Guns and Ammo at the Y, the Brettonians of Liam the Young, and whoever else I've forgotten, as for you all, please RSVP so we can accomodate your spot in concrete.
Signed,
his everlasting wonderfulness most powerful and benevolent kingship.....me.

Chaos Versus the Brets, 2500 points.

(If you click on this picture, it will enlarge and you will see side by side my chaotic paint job on Galrauch next to the stellar, easy on they eyes paint job my brother Fixed Dice did on his Dark Elf dragon. In both games the Dragons would lend themselves to an argument the era of "Herohammer" is still upon us.)

Note: I neglected to take notes on this game, so it is almost entirely from memory. Skip down to the BOLD section if you just want to read about the game. Everything before that is fluff. 

Going in, I was not sure who I would be facing. I had finally finished gluing my dragon...sort of...and really, really, really wanted to play one. So despite my miserable, pathetic, humiliating, pointless, horrific history with magic, I put Galrauch in. (One wing would fall off during turn 5, which the observant will note in the pictures.)

Part of my Army Building philosophy is to generally not take units whose primary benefit is essentially self-counter-acting. Since a basic dragon with nearly identical stats is costing me 320 I decided to go a heavy magic army. So I put in 3 Level 2 Sorcerers. 2 I gave the Mark of Tzeentch and one I game the Mark of Nurgle. 

By the way, in the entire game, not once did I remember to use the +1 to cast that Tzeentch gives. That is despite highlighting that little factoid on my index unit cards. 

One of them got a Power Familiar so I would have 13 power dice and 7 Dispel dice. In addition, I gave one unit a Magic Standard, adding a Bound Spell. I SHOULD get some good magic off. 

Next, core units. Since I only have 20 Maurauders and 24 Chaos Warriors, my choices at this point were limited. I elected to go simple:

2 each 10 man units of Marauders with no upgrades, 40 points each. That is basically giving away 40 - 80 points since I have no intent of charging anybody with them. If I get matched up with a heavy shooting army, I will use them as a screen, just march them straight into the shooters and let them absorb the damage instead of someone I care about getting shot up. Cheap, expendable. Fair enough.

Then, to fill out my core units I put in 24 Chaos Warriors with Shield and Full Command. This would be my most expensive unit. However, with the Blasted Standard giving them a 5+ Ward verse shooting, a T of 4 and a save of 3+/2+, they SHOULD be pretty rugged. Ironically, I forgot to give them the Mark of Nurgle which I paid the points for. Sigh. Anyhow, 364 point unit. I planned to use them in the center of the field and flank with my favorite units...the Knights.

I took 2 units of Chaos Knights, each with Shields and Mark of Nurgle. One unit got the Banner of Wrath (the Bound Magic Missile) and the other with the Banner of Rage giving them Frenzy. 

Since I had  points left over, I used a unit I intended to never include, 10 Chaos Warhounds. I know their uses, but much like the Maurauders, they do not fit my play style. Also, by not taking them I would leave a nice hole in my army for talented opponents to exploit. 

Then I went and used the last points to give the Mark of Nurgle to each Marauder regminent and was done.

Well, normally we have 8 or 10 people with a nice mix of armies. This week, though, Fullur was out of town, Chad was injured, Pete had prior commitments, Space Monkey was motorcycle riding, Josh was "otherwise occupied", Cris was helping paint the church, and so forth. So we only had three of us; Kev, Fixed Dice, and myself. So we were going to play split armies; Kev's Ogres versus Fixed Dice's Dark Elves with me taking a couple of his units, then Kev's Ogres versus my Chaos. 

Fortunately, at the last minute, Liam showed up. We helped him upgrade (via proxies) to 2500 points.

None of us have played Bretonnians for almost 15 years so I was not real sure what to expect. But here is a shock:With classic "small number of model" armies Chaos, Bretonnia, and the Ogres on the field, the smallest number of models put in play? The Dark Elves. Ha! And the Brets had the most...by over 40 models. As yuo can see, lots of proxies...but that is good because it means we got in a great game.

Setup

We had a very hilly field. There was a steep field in Liam's right flank, another hill in front of him, 2 hills in the center/right part of the field, a small village in my right flank, and a small forest between the steep hill and yet another steep hill in MY deployment zone. Pretty crowded field. 

I won the roll to see who would set up first. I wanted to see where he put his 30 bowmen so I had him put one on first. Hmm. Poor choice. He had like 17 units. I had I think 5 plus my Heroes.  So he could out wait me. 

Fortunately for me, this was his first game. We helped him with minor tweaks to his setup but in truth it was badly flawed. I am not really familiar with the Brets so only once the game started did I realize how badly. Then again, my setup was very, very weak in this game. 

He put Knight Errants in the gap in his left-center. I planted my Warhounds opposite them. He placed another Errant unit a few inches to the left (from his viewpoint) of it. I put a Chaos Marauder unit on my left flank behind the steep hill. My plan was to wait for my deployment zone to clear out, hide one Marauder unit behind the hill to control that table quarter, then move the other Marauder unit over to control the right table quarter while my Knights and Warriors advanced into his zone and ran rampage. 

Rules Error

He then placed a trebuchet on the hill in his right flank. As a War Machine, it should have been placed after all his regular units. I forgot about that until I was typing this up. And it had a huge effect. I did not know how big the template would be so I did not want some lucky Trebuchet shot taking out mass amounts of my troops. On the fly I changed my plan. I placed my Warriors out alone on my right flank. 

As a general rule I do not put ANY unit, no matter how strong it is, out on its own. We will see why in a while. 

One unit of Knights went behind the Warhounds, the other slightly off to their right.

Meanwhile, Liam had troops EVERYWHERE. Three units of Knights opposite my Warhounds (0ne with his General in it), 2 more Knight units on his left flank opposite my Chaos Warriors, one of them being Grail Knights with the Army Battle Standard, and somewhere in the neighborhood of 10,000 peasants/men at arms/peons EVERYWHERE as well as a Grail Reliquae on the hill next to his trebuchet.

He prayed for the Blessing of the Lady (Wise move) giving me the first turn.

Chaos Turn One

I marched the Warhounds straight forward 14 inches, advanced the Knights behind them 7" and the other Knights up on the hill. I walked the Warriors forward 4".

Why the Knights 7"? Because I am an idiot. I knew the Warhounds would get beat by his Knights  and overrun. I wanted the charge. But after I moved, I remembered he would follow 3d6 inches...meaning he would probably get the charge. In the old edition, I played the Brets and know the power of a Lance Formation charge with Lances. I did NOT want that to happen.

I flew Galrauch forward to get a look at his Trebuchet. It would be protected for a turn by the Reliquae, but no problem.

Rules Error:I forgot to take his Leadership test to see if he attacked himself. I would remember every other turn.

And now, time to unleash the fury of my magic. First I cast the bound spell. He let it go. D6 S4 hits. If you read the links up above, you probably already know what happened. I rolled a 1 for how many hits and a 2 to wound...so no damage. I then cast Pandemonium. He used some Mirror magic item that dispelled it and hit me at S6. I took a wound. Magic not too good so far. But then something strange, something unforeseen, something nigh on unbelievable happened. 

I cast Cloying Quagmire. Successfully. With irresistible force. On the unit with his General. He lost 2 or 3 guys. The most success I have ever had with magic. In fact, more success than I have had in all my other games combined. 

Fortunately, I then made up for it by Miscasting with Galrauch. On 3 dice. It was the one that let him cast a spell automatically. It was some Crow attack that would have hit my 24 Warriors and 2 Sorcerers so I took no chances, just used a Dispel Scroll.

I then thought I had missed the shooting phase so did not use Galrauch's breath attack. Ironically, this would be my only opportunity in the entire game to use it so I never once used any of his three breath attack options. Idiot.

Bretonnian Turn One

He declared charges on the warhounds with 3 units of Knights. I suddenly realized he would be almost certain to annihilate the Warhounds and with the overrun be getting multiple charges into my Knights. This would be very, very bad for me. So I chose flee as my reaction knowing they could use Galrauch's leadership of 9 to recover and even if not...they were 100 points. Who cares. 

This resulted in him failing the charges and being left within Charge range of my Knights. I wish you could hear how this sounds. "He he he". That is at least an evil chortle. Perhaps even an evil guffaw.

Everyone else shuffled around and moved forward except his War Machines on the hill. He was going to pass the Magic phase but we convinced him to use it. He had no line of sight so passed it the first time. Shooting.

His trebuchet looked at my mass of warriors. He initially said 48", then reconsidered. "34" he said. Measured. The template was about 1-1/2" short of my unit. A scatter roll could be devastating to me. A bunch of S5 and S10 hits could certainly due some damage. But...he rolled "Hit" on the scatter die. Whew! Disaster (temporarily) averted.

By the way, please note: there was no shooting from his 30 peasants. That indicates a set-up problem. When you have LARGE shooting units...get them in position to shoot. Especially low strength shooters. It takes them a lot of shots to be effective. 

Chaos Turn 2

First, Galrauch's test. Failed. Yep, the first one I remembered to do, he failed. Hit himself twice. Wounded himself once. Failed his Ward save. I already wounded myself.

Even worse, remember my awesome plan to use Galrauch's leadership to let the Warhounds recover? Well...I had flown him forward 20". He was about 30" from the Warhounds at this point. They now would rely on their own Leadership of 5. They rolled an 8. To run, they rolled a 17. Buh-bye now. 

For those keeping track, in this turn alone I did 100 points and a wound to myself. So far. Magic phase still ahead...

Time to do what Chaos does best. My Knights announce a charge against what turns out to be the Mounted Yeoman. My other Knights announce a charge on  his other Mounted Yeoman, leaving his General-led unit between them alone. 

Why?

Well, first off, I was unsure of the hitting power of my Knights against a unit I was unfamiliar with. Second, I wanted to make him take break tests. Third, I planned to flank charge with Galrauch and, when I broke the left wing of his army, Galrauch would get a flank charge on the General's unit.

Fortunately, Fixed Dice pointed out, "Isn't there a forest there? He has no line of sight." SO we avoided another rules error.

D'oh. True. I forgot about that. So I had no charge on them. SO I charged the Grail Reliquae on the hill.

First, break tests. His unit on my right flank held. His unit on the left flank...failed. Double 6s. I had enough movement to charge into the Men at Arms behind them. 

On the hill, his Grail Reliquae crew...failed. I had enough movement to charge into his Trebuchet.

Meanwhile, I knew I had erred in the first turn with my Warriors. Now they were too far to get the charge on his Grail Knights and not far enough to avoid being charged. I considered breaking my sorcerers off from the unit but then thought having them in to offer Challenges might turn the combat in my favor. Between them, mu unit champion, my rank bonus of 3, and outnumbering, I might win the combat.

On to the most effective phase ever, magic. Let's save time. Every. Single. Thing. Failed or Dispelled. Except, of course, for the requisite Miscast, this time on 2 dice. Think about that for a second...

Shooting: My Dragon was in Hand to Hand, no Breath.

Combat. 

Bwoohahaha. (Pure evil, that laugh.)

Rules Error:With Galrauch and two units of Knights in combat, I declared zero challenges. Oops.

Dragon wipes out Trebuchet crew. Well, not really, he just does 2, but the crew breaks and runs.Pursue down the hill. Don't catch them. Yeah, whatever. 

The first unit of Knights does about 5 casualties. He breaks, I pursue into the unit behind. The Men at Arms take I think 6 casualties. He started with a rank bonus of 3 and outnumbering and lost the combat. Badly. I pursue into another unit behind. Things look good. 

In one turn I have his Grail Reliquae, Trebuchet, and two units of mounted guys on the run. I get out of line of sight of his General-led unit.

Bretonnian Turn 2

Time to do what Grail Knights do best. Charge. Along with another unit. Into my Warriors. No problem.

Time to rally. Well, now he was out of range of Knights with all his peasants so they were testing on 6s and 8s. Every fleeing unit left the table. 

He also flank charged my Knights that were engaged with his Peasants with some more Yeoman or something after passing a fear test. He started moving his General-led unit towards the Chaos Warrior combat. He flew his Pegasus Knight behind the Knights he flank charged to get a rear charge next turn if necessary.

We started with that combat. He accepted both challenges. He then killed one Warrior with one unit of Knights and 3 more with the Grail Knights. 

I did not one wound back. Not in a challenge. Not with my Champion. None. Uh-oh.

Well, he had a rank bonus of 2, did 4 casualties to me, had not just a Standard but also the Army Standard Bearer with a Banner giving him plus one combat resolution. The math says I ran like a bunch of little girls and he overran me. Uh...remember how it seemed I was doing good? 

Trebuchets and Battle Reliquaes are cheap. So are Yeomen and peasants.

Chaos Warriors and Sorcerers are not. He just did almost 800 points to me. Plus the Warhounds were gone. At this point he was winning big, about 900-500 or so.

But wait, it was worse: apparently his Standard Bearer had an ability or something that meant my captured standard was worth not 100 but 200 points. I was doubled up.

The other combats went better for me. I did I think 8 more casualties in the combat where he had the flank charge to none for him. He had a rank bonus of 3, a flank charge which also gave him the banner plus since mine was invalidated, and outnumbering. I did 8 casualties. His flanking unit ran...and the peasants stood firm. What?

On the other side, I crushed his peasants and pursued them because I had Frenzy. He ran into Galrauch and died.

Chaos Turn 3

Galrauch passed his Leadership test. (He would pass for the rest of the game so I won't mention it again). 

Galrauch charged the back of that stubborn peasant unit. My Knights charged his peasant bowmen. (Did you notice they had yet to fire in the entire game?) They failed their Fear test and fled.

By now my Marauders were almost over to the right table quarter. However, I could see where his Grail Knights would kill them so I switched directions and started heading for the village. My other Marauders climbed the steep hill with my Nurgle Sorcerer climbing higher.

Magic was uneventful except yet another Mis-cast which let him cast some spell that meant I would not be able to move one unit of Knights the next turn. 

Close Combat was SWEET and stupid. My Knights, Galrauch, and the horses did 13 casualties to his peasants. The last 2 fled. 

Here is where it gets stupid. If Galrauch was an inch behind them, they would be destroyed when they ran into him. BUT since he was IN the combat and was the weaker unit size they were allowed to run past him. Huh?

Now, I did not want to pursue with my Knights even further from the center of the table. But I DID want Galrauch to go straight ahead which would take him (probably) into the rear of the General-led unit. But since the peasants went BEHIND him, he could only go further away. The Knights failed their Leadership test to not pursue...and could not catch the fleeing units. Galrauch passed.

Bretonnian Turn 3

His General and everyone else essentially moved over towards my right table quarter. I believe this was a mistake. It took his Grail Knights essentially out of the battle along with everyone else. Sure, I got no charges...but he had nobody in combat. His peasants did rally. They unleashed 30 arrows at the dragon. Like 20 of them, a ridiculously high number, hit. None of them, an even more ridiculously low number, wounded. 

Chaos Turn 4

Galrauch charged the peasant bowmen. Out of range of any Knight, they failed their Terror or Fear test and were done. My Knights that could move turned and headed towards his advancing/fleeing General led unit. My Marauders, just outside 8", were able to march which kept them out of his line of sight.

Magic: I actually got Quagmire off again, killing another Grail Knight. And for the fourth consecutive turn...I Miscast. *Sigh*

Bretonnian Turn 4

He circled the village trying to get in charge range of my Marauders. His Magic? He cast with Irresistible Force the "Unit can't move" spell.  Yeah, I had a 4th level and 3 2nd level sorcerers. He had 2 first level and dominated the magic phase.

Chaos Turn 5

I would not be able to avoid the charge so I reformed my Marauders to face the charge and moved my able-to-move Knights into position where after he overran the Marauders I would flank charge him. My immobile Knights were already in position to charge head on.

I flew Galrauch up close to the village so he could also get involved in the combat after my Marauders died.

Magic was exciting and awesome. I got off 11 hits at 2D6 strength. If I rolled an 11 or 12 his Grail Knights and Battle Standard bearer would be gone for good. Instead I rolled...snake eyes. And out of 11 hits did zero wounds. 

Magic blows mighty chunks for me. Even when I get hyper-powerful spells off with irresistible force...I do nothing.

Bretonnian Turn 5

He initially declared the charge. Then we convinced him it was a bad idea since he would probably get wiped out by my mighty counter-charge. 

He then tried the spell again and for the first time he failed a casting roll and I used The Black Tongue to make it a mis-cast, doing a wound to his sorcerer for a change.

Chaos Turn 6

I had no charges so I simply moved the Marauders out of his charge range and into that table quarter to contest it, moved Knights to his starting zones to win one quarter and contest the other. Galrauch charged his Grail Knight and Battle Standard Bearer. I declared a challenge (I remembered to do that in every combat except the first one), killed his Standard Bearer, the Grail Knight broke, I got my standard back, took his. 

Bretonnian Turn 6

He wasn't going to do anything but someone convinced him to use his Pegasus Knight for the first time in the game to charge my Nurgle Sorcerer.

I forgot I had A) the Steep Hill advantage and B) The Mark of Nurgle to make me harder to hit. He killed me. That 190 points would matter.

Who Wins?

He started out looking good. He killed:

Chaos Sorcerers worth 230, 205, and 190 points.

(625) points.

Warhounds worth 100 points.

(725)

Chaos Warriors worth 364 points

(1089)

He lost the Banner Bonus since I took it back and had no Table Quarters. 

I don't know the point totals of what I killed but I controlled 2 table quarters, captured is Grail Knight and Battle Standard banners. Apparently there is some special rule that meant all the peasant banners I captured, like 6 of them, were not worth anything. But I did kill all but 1037 points of his so I killed approximately 1463 points of them, plus 200 for table quarters, + 100 apiece for the Grail Knight and Battle Standard banners for a total of 2156.

2156-1089 is a 1074 point difference, a solid victory for Chaos.

Game Roundup

It was Liam's first game so I considered playing soft and letting him win. However, to his credit, before the game he said something along the lines of "Don't go soft on me". So I went about 3/4 speed. We did help him with a couple of set-up errors, but not all of them.

He should have had his archers up front. He should have used his Men at Arms and other low-point units as screens to set himself up to get the charges. He should have not hidden all his power units in the far corner for almost half the game. When he got stuck circling the village for 3 turns, it essentially decided the game in my favor. Had they been involved they might have done enough damage to, if not outright win it for him, at least make it a draw.

Also, while I understand his rationale in moving the Army Standard bearer with the Grail Knights, it came back to haunt him when the combo of General and Army Standard Bearer out of range meant he had one shot to save his fleeing Reliquae/Trebuchet/Bowmen/Yoemen with low Leaderships. If he could re-roll at least the 8 leadership guys, they might have stayed around. A Banner on the flank doesn't help much when your points are in the middle.

When he had the points advantage, he did not use it. Instead, he dispersed his forces while I was able to concentrate mine. The peasants/Yeomen/Knights Errant are support troops he used as frontline troops instead of support troops. His frontline troops did awesome when they were stuck in combat but the game was lost for him in the Maneuver phase.

By contrast, I was able to focus 2 units of Knights and my Dragon on his support troops and ran wild on them, destroying them left and right. I lost troops because of my initial set-up but overcame that with superior maneuver and keeping my power troops where they could do damage. 

If I had it to do over again, I would put the Warriors in the center like I initially planned, the Knights to the side to flank charge anyone brave enough to go into battle against my Warriors. I would let the Trebuchet do what it would for one turn before my Dragon flew into it in turn 2. I would then be in position to Rear charge the melee in the middle of the table. 

We both made mistakes but his were more costly.

I will say, after he left, Space Monkey, Fixed Dice, Kev, Cris and I were talking about how impressed we were that he recognized the things he had done wrong and was already talking about how to fix them; fewer peasants, more Knights, better set-up, keeping the power together, etc. 

He is young, it was his first game, and he did very, very well to keep the game as close as it was. It was a very fun game and I look forward to meeting him in the campaigns. I foresee some epic Brettonian-Chaos games with mighty clashes of Grail Knights and Chaos Knights with legendary challenges between kitted-out Bret Heroes and Chaos Exalted Heroes. I am drooling over those forthcoming encounters as I type this.

I also look forward to building better armies. You know...those who don't waste points on magic? I mean, sure, I did kill 3 or 4 Grail Knights with it. But was that really worth 296 points for Galrauch* and 625 points to support him?No, it did nowhere near 1000 points. In fact, as I pointed out above, 2 Level 1 wizardesses completely owned the magic phase. Their ability to keep my Knights from moving at key points cost me a couple hundred points. 

So I will use more Chaos Lords and Exalted Heroes to own the close combat phase. Probably. I did just buy Sigvald. 

* Galrauch costs 616. But a regular dragon with the same stat line except I3 instead of 6 the only difference in stats that matter is 320. So I basically paid the rest for Magic. Well, okay, leadership if he is the army general. But really for the magic.

Warhammer Warbands: Chaos Versus the world

The Starving Crazed Weasels decided to try some Warbands Escalation. Starting with 200 point armies, we were going to try to run all the way up to 500. So I frantically painted but was unable to complete any Marauders so I would be using some proxies. 

In just 200 points I was going to have to use Marauders in order to fit in any Knights. Per the rules, I either had to have a character of no more than 150 points or else a unit Champion. However, to get a unit Champion, I had to have a LEGAL minimum size unit instead of a 2 Cavalry or 3 Infantry unit.

Since Chaos Warriors cost a minimum of 16 points apiece after their mandatory upgrade, if I took 10 of them and a Champion I am at 172 points, leaving 28...not enough to fit in the requires 2 Knights. Actually, I could not even fit in one of the 40 point buzzards. 

At the same time, part of my army-building philosophy is to never take units that can't do anything. For example, Chaos Marauders have the combination of traits I try to avoid. To keep them affordable they have no armor, a strength of 3 and a toughness of 3. That means they are easy to kill. With no ranged weapons in the Chaos Army they are likely to get shot down while crossing the field. That means they are worse than useless; not only are they unable to accomplish anything, they are basically free points for the opponent. I am better off taking nothing than taking Marauders.

Of course, you could argue I CAN tool them up; give them light armor and shields (Save 5+), maybe the Mark of Tzeentch (6+ Ward Save). Except now they are over half the cost of a Chaos Warrior and, in the group we play in, unlikely to have a save anyway: the Dark Elves have Armor Piercing on their Repeater Crossbows meaning the save is 6+, the Dwarf army has Armor Piercing on their strength 4 Weapons meaning no save, the Ogres have S4 Weapons meaning the save is at best 6+: in other words, the points spent on tooling them up are essentially wasted.

Well, what I REALLY wanted to do was put some Knights on the table. I had 5 of them painted to at least tabletop standard, though I still have some highlighting and shading to do. But I really, really, really wanted to get some Knights rolling. I would rather roll out 5 Knights and lose than no Knights and win. 

But the rules forced me to put some Marauders out there. If I am going to have to use pointless troops and get limited or no Knights then I want to win a little bit.

So I went for an army that would be well-balanced enough to have at least a fighting chance against Dark Elves, Ogres, Lizardmen, Dwarfs, Wood Elfs and possibly the Vampire Counts based on who I thought might show up.  As it turned out, the V.C. guy was out of town, the guy playing the Wood Elfs had to work, and the guys playing the Ogres and Lizardmen were only there for a game or two each.

I started with my General. Since the cheapest hero I have is the Chaos Sorcerer, in he went, 85 points, level one, Lore of Death or Fire (I chose Death). 

Then I needed two core units. Chaos Marauders at 4 points each mean if I go 3 of each, another 24 points, I am up to 109. Cool, that let me fit in two Knights, the only models I REALLY wanted to play. 280, we were letting people have up to 203 points so I bumped one unit of Marauders to 4 and the other to 5 guys. 201 points. 

Game one I drew Kev and his Ogres. Uh-oh...exactly one of the reasons I hate Marauders. 

Lets assume I get 100 attacks and Kev gets 100 attacks. I have a higher weapon skill so SHOULD hit about 66% of the time, so I will hit him 66 times. I then have a 1 in 3 chance of wounding so 22 wounds. He has a 5+ armor save so will save 1 in 3 so I will do about 14 wounds in 100 attacks if all goes strictly according to statistics. 

He will hit me 1 in 3 times, or about 33 times. He will wound 2 in 3, or 22 times. All of those will kill me.

So I am doing 14 wounds in 100 attacks, he is doing 22. Each wound I cause goes 1/3 of the way toward reducing the number of attacks he gets whereas each wound he does reduces the number of attacks I get. See the problem here? I need way more force in Marauders to equal his Bulls. 

So for this battle, my Marauders will basically try to maneuver out of his way and let the Knights do all the heavy lifting. That is where Kev has the problem.

He will still hit 1/3 of the time. However, he then wounds just 50% of the time, let's round up to 17. I am going to save 5 out of 6 of those, so he should do about 3 casualties in 100 attacks. 

Conversely, I will hit 66 times, wound 33 of those, and he will save just 1 in 6, so I should do 27-28 wounds in 100 attacks.

Of course, these are just basic statistical models and as any competent mathematician will tell you, a sample size of 100 is ridiculously small and inaccurate. These numbers will be born out of hundreds of thousands of rolls, not over a short time. On to the game.

Setup

We had a small village in the center of the table, a river basically closing off one corner, and a tower opposite the village. Plenty of obstacles to make maneuver important. I won the roll to go first. My mission was Hold Table Quarter.

Chaos Turn one

I march everyone forward planning to hide behind the village with the Marauders (and occupy a table quarter with each of them), get off a little bit of magic, and when they got close, charge the Knights.

I did try to cast my Magic Missile. I used both allowed dice, rolled a 5. Successful...but dispelled. What? Magic failed? I...I...I...I just don't believe it. This has never happened before except every other time I have tried to use magic...

Ogre Turn 1

His Gnoblars bickered, so they stood still. Everyone else advanced a march move. He also wanted to get into hand to hand since he had no magic and only his Gnoblars had range.

Chaos Turn 2

Walk forward with the 5 man Marauders, move my sorcerer to the left to get line of sight on his Bull, move my Knights further left to either give me a flank charge if he ignored me or just plain give me the charge if not. This time for Dark Hand of Death I roll a 6 and again he dispelled it. Ah, Magic, how I love thee. Like a superfluous second belly button you are. Not really good for much and not all that attractive.

Ogre Turn 2

He advanced everybody and had one charge. He charged the Marauders with 2 Bulls. Rules Error: We forgot he had to have 3 Bulls for the Bull charge and he killed one Marauder with a Bull Charge, killed 2 more in close combat, I broke 7", he pursued 5. 

Chaos Turn 3

His breaking of my guys meant I had no charge. Fortunately (?) my fleeing guys rallied. Of course, standing 2" in front of his Bulls...did it matter? I maneuvered my Knights to get a charge hopefully next turn. Oh, and in case you wondered...I rolled a 7 (getting HIGHER!) to cast and yeah, he dispelled it.

Ogre Turn 3

2 charges. He Bull Charged the 4 man Chaos, 1 Impact hit, 2 more in close combat, I actually do a wound (!) in return, needing a 5, I pass my break test...RULES ERROR;when outnumbered by someone you fear, you auto-break. 

He also charged the remainder of the 5 man, they lost the combat, ran 5", he over ran 7" and they were done. 

Chaos Turn 4

My Knights finally charge. Then, Magic phase. This time, to save time, I did not even cast it successfully. 

First we do the combat of my one remaining Marauder. He actually caused a wound! I am highly impressed. Just 9 Marauders somehow inflicted 2 wounds. Of course, he is then slain...still, 36 points of Marauders did 24 points worth of damage...or 24 points more than I figured they would. On the dark side, his fast-moving Ogres prevented me from hiding behind the buildings which meant I could not control a table quarter...

The Knights actually did what they were supposed to. They kill one of his Ogres outright and the suffer no wounds in return. The remaining Ogre breaks and runs just 6". I roll my 3D6 to pursue...and roll out triple 1s. 

Ogre Turn 4

He fails to rally, runs 11". Everyone moves towards my Knights but stay out of my line of sight. Because of the direction he fled I cannot even see the fleeing Ogre. Great turn for the Ogres. 

Chaos Turn 5

Move my Knights to follow the fleeing Ogre (and prevent him from getting a charge) and move my Sorcerer back to also avoid a charge. And something very, very exciting happened.

I rolled a 6 to cast Dark Hand of Death...and he rolled Snake Eyes! Finally! A SUCCESSFUL magic spell! I now get to do D6 hits at S6. So I roll for how many...1. Then I roll to see if the hit wounds...and roll a 1. 

Let me just save time; the rest of the day in games against the Dwarf army, Dark Elf Army twice, Lizardmen, I do not again get a spell cast successfully even though  three of those games I had a level 2 wizard and was rolling the maximum three dice. Magic on my behalf totally sucks. Worthless. Wasted points. So depressing. 

Ogre Turn 5

He does not much, can't catch me, and his Ogre finally rallies.

Chaos Turn 6

I charge his rallied Ogre, kill him. 

Ogre Turn 6. 

Grabs table quarter. That is all he can do.

Final Results

He killed 36 points of Marauders. We thought he got 100 points for table quarter, but  re-reading of the rules says no points for Table Quarter unless it is your objective. Meanwhile, that WAS my objective and it turns out the minimum unit size is only 2. Unfortunately, he controlled as many table quarters as I did. Actually, with his Gnoblars in one quarter and 2 1-bull units in the other, he out-controlled table quarters 2-1. I did, however, score 108 points of damage for a final tally of 108-36 (which is different than what we thought at the time).

72 points, Victory belongs to Chaos.

Game Two: Chaos Versus Dwarf Army

We fought on the same battlefield. Again I won the first turn. This game was pretty quick. I simply moved my Marauders behind two different buildings to grab two table quarters and started maneuvering my Knights to charge his Warriors. He had a gun line of Thunderers and I had no intention of allowing them to shoot at my Marauders and did not particularly want him shooting at my Knights, either.

Meanwhile, he was maneuvering his Warriors to get the charge, so we did some hide and seek before finally he had to leave me line of sight to them for turn 5

Chaos Turn 5

By the time we reached turn 5 we were maybe 6 minutes into the game...INCLUDING setup. I finally got the charge.  Planning to support them, I move my 5 man Chaos Unit forward knowing they would be covered by the battle and also thinking I was out of range of the Thunderers anyway. Plus I joined my Sorcerer to them. Space Monkey passed his Fear test, I did two casualties to him, he did none in return but he did not run.

Dwarf Turn 5

Oops. During turn 5...well, a couple of my Marauders were exposed. He shot and killed 2 of them. They broke. 

In hand to hand I killed 2 more of his guys but he killed one of my Knights. This time he broke and I followed, overrunning him and running clean off the table. 

Chaos Turn 6

My fleeing guys rally, I forgot to bring my other Knight back on...not that it would have mattered. I was out of the firing arc of his Thunderers and could not contest the table quarter.

Dwarf Turn 6

He had nothing to do, game.

Final Results

We mis-figured it again* thinking he got points for the table quarter. I actually held 2 table quarters to his one and had chosen Invade so his points were 40 points for killing the Knight. I scored 126 for killing his Thane and Warriors, nothing for Invade. It was an 86 point advantage for me, another Victory. 

*(We initially thought he got 100 for the table quarter + 40 for the Knight + 40 for achieving his objective giving him 180 points which would have been a victory for him)

Chaos Victory, 2-0.

Game Three:Chaos Versus Dark Elf

This time we would be on the other table that had been set up. He had a hill on his side of the table, I had a forest on mine. I hid two units behind the forest, one unit on the right planning to overwhelm that side of the field. But I forgot how fast Elf armies move...

Once more I rolled Capture a Standard so got to choose my own. I knew the only way to win was kill his Sorceress fast so I chose Assassinate.

Dark Elf Turn One

He advances everyone up onto the hill. I see my Marauders will get shot down next turn.

Chaos Turn One

I start moving my Marauders over to hide behind the Forest. I know his crossbows will get 3 turns of shooting at them so they are just casualties. I put the Knights in front and move towards him as much as possible but he is too close for me to march.

Dark Elf Turn Two

He successfully casts a magic spell that kills both of my Knights and shoots down a Marauder.

Rest of Game

I have no chance of getting to him before he can shoot and magic me down so I just move behind the forest and will not move again. There is no point to him moving either so the game is over at that point. 

I thought I had a table quarter...well, he had one too. So he scored 80 for the Knights, an 80 point Dark Elf Victory.

2-1

We bumped it up to 300 points and again it was Dark Elf versus Chaos. At this point we had stopped taking pictures and notes, so this is largely memory.

I now had a level 2 sorcerer, 3 Knights, and 10 Chaos Marauders. He had a Bolt Thrower, level 2 sorcerer, and a couple other units.

The field we rolled meant we would start about an inch apart. His Bolt Thrower was on the corner as were my Knights. Behind his Bolt Thrower were 3  Repeater Crossbows and down the hill behind a fence were his Sorceress with that same stupid 18" area of effect spell and a few warriors. I had 5 Marauders and my Sorcerer to my Knights' left and the other unit behind them.

I won the first turn.

Chaos Turn 1

"Charge!" My Knights and Marauders declare charge. His Bolt Thrower crew failed their fear test. Depending on point of view...that was HORRIBLE.

If he stands and I get into hand to hand I should easily defeat him and either kill him outright or else overrun right into his repeater crossbows. I could do lots of damage right off the bat. Instead, it became a failed charge. I mean, sure, I marched up the hill and destroyed the bolt thrower, but it put my Knights and Marauders in the open in front of his Crossbows and within 18" of the Sorceress.

Dark Elf Turn 2

His fleeing crew failed their rally test. Again, bad for me. I could have charged them with my Marauders on the left flank the next turn but this meant they got out of my range. Then he cast his magic.

First he rolled 2 dice on the one that adds D3 dice to his pool. Looking back at the game he thought he rolled a 9, I thought he rolled an 11. Either way, with only 3 Dispel dice, I wasn't going to try to stop it. So then he had 4 dice, rolled them all for the Area of Effect spell. I planned to Dispel it but he rolled Irresistible Force. 

2 of my 3 Knights died, the other one fled. 2 of my 5 Marauders died, the other 3 and the Sorcerer fled.

Chaos Turn 2

Everyone RALLIED. Yeah.

Dark Elf Turn 2

He moved his Crossbows forward to get line of sight. His shooting missed. Oh, some good news! His magic did no damage.

Chaos Turn 3

I get the charge on his Crossbows, kill them, get to the crest of the hill. 

Dark Elf Turn 3

Not much happened.

Chaos Turn 4

I advance down the hill, too far away to get the charge. My other Marauders also advance.

Dark Elf Turn 4

Again he gets Irresistible Force. My last Knight died, as did another Marauder. 

Chaos Turn 5

At this point it looked pretty bad for me. I had my Sorcerer (who remember had cast 1 (one) spell successfully all day, doing a total of zero casualties. He had a couple small units and his sorceress behind a fence which meant I could not really get any benefits from charging. However, I HAD to charge or else sit there and let him cast magic. So I did. I charged even with no expectations. 

But then something happened. My Marauders killed a couple guys. He did no return wounds. He failed his break test and ran. I could not catch him.

Dark Elf Turn 5

He failed his rally test. He fled the table. Game over.

What? He killed all my knights, over a third of my Marauders, twice cast successful spells and I crushed him? I am confused.

Sure, him losing 1/3rd of his army in the first moment hurt...but that still shocked me. It was the first points my Marauders earned all day in combat.

Final tally: He got 130 for Knights and Marauders (ironically, the highest total scored against me all day). I got 300 for his army plus 60 for achieving my Assasinate goal. A Massacre.

At this point I was 3-1 with one Massacre for me and one against me (both against the Dark Elf army.)

Game Five: Chaos Versus Lizardmen

Fullur came over with his Lizardmen, pointed out that we had been playing wrong. He pointed out that, depending on your reading of the rules, we could NOT, in fact, have characters worth more than 75 points. It was 150 points TOTAL, not each. 

In other words, I could not use any character in my entire army since the cheapest one is a mere 85 points...10 points over the maximum allowed. So I had to retool.

Well, there was no way I was going with a Marauder Champion so I went with Chaos Warriors, a unit I typically eschew because they are too expensive for a unit that is unlikely to ever actually get into combat. 10 guys at 15 points plus a mandatory upgrade plus a Champion, 172 points. 

3 Knights, another 120 points. 3 Marauders 304 points. Due to my victory, I was actually allowed 310 so I added a 4th Marauder.

Facing me would be I think 3 units of Skinks, one of which had a Kroxigor in it, and a Skink Priest.

Lots of shooting by him, lots of marching forward by me. Somewhere along the line I lost a Warrior to his shooting so no rank bonus for me. I got the charge with my Knights on one of his Skin units. Their Stand and Shoot killed a Knight, the other two rampaged through his unit.

Meanwhile, he outmaneuvered me on the other flank and got a flank charge on my Warriors but also charged them frontally with his Skinks. 

I made all my saves, did back five casualties (this is the moment Fullur was talking about  where he gave me an unneeded advantage. He let me make a lot of attacks that I should not have gotten. As a result, both his units broke and fled. From there it was just mop-up and the game became a massacre.

Eventually his Kroxigor and Skink rallied only to be charged by my Knights.

Oddly, he out-generaled me in the maneuver phase. I typically feel I win the maneuver phases, but not this time. He made just one mistake...charging my front. 

For the day I went 4-1. Much better than I thought I did and better than I wanted to do. Oh, well. It was all right.

Ultmiately looking at Warbands I am a bit disappointed. It forces you to use units that have little to no capability and does not let you use units that are actually fun to play or, if it does, they are disproportionately penalized by individual bad moments. 

My Knights did perform fairly well. They wrecked the Dwarf Warriors, killed a couple Ogre Bulls, their Fear caused a Bolt Thrower to get destroyed. On the other hand, they were much more fragile than I anticipated, taking casualties in every game except the Ogre game...which, by the way, was the one I thought they wer most likely to take a casualty in.

The Sorcerer was worse than ever. I am seriously considering taking no magic at all in future battles since it never does anything. However, in light of the need to stop stuff like the hyper destructive Dark Elf magic, I think I will probably have to take some low level guys with Dispel Scrolls. 

All in all, it was okay, but I would much rather play games where I can actually have enough Knights that I don't have to fear I won't get them into combat if they take even a single casualty.