Dark Elves Vs. Lizardmen @ 2500 Points

Did Lord Kroak just twitch? No, it couldn't be. The great toad had only been sleeping for a few centuries. It must have been a carrion beetle moving about underneath the ancient Slann's wrappings. But there it was again. Dreadlord Bait, one of the great lord's attendents looked intensly at the ancient undead being to see whether it would move again.




Slowly, the priest's mind began to fill with certain thoughts. The abominable dirtmen, sometimes called dark elves were once again trying to raid the jungles of Lustria. This would not do at all. DBait as the other priests called him for short (actually, it was hsssssss isss sss s, but the rough translation comes out DBait), quickly gave orders to the other priests to gather the cohort. "This is quite fortuitous" thought DBait. The new spawning of Saurus with their innate ability to ride cold ones need to be tested in battle. This should prove interesting.




Okay, with the fluff out of the way, lets get down to descriptions. I brought into this battle:




Lord Kroak
L2 Skink Priest w/2 Dispel Scrolls
L2 Skink Priest w/Cube of Darkness & Dragonfly of Quicksilver
Saurus Scar Veteran on Cold One
21 Saurus Warriors w/Spears, Champion, Standard Bearer
2x10 Skink Skirmishers w/Javelin & Shields
10 Temple Guard w/Champion, Standard Bearer w/War Banner
2xStegadon
8xCold One Cavalry w/Champion, Standard Bearer w/Sun Standard of Chotec




My plan was to put the Temple Guard in the middle with the Saurus to one side and a Steg or two to the other. I would use one of the Skink units to screen, and if possible use the other to harry the opponents troops. Then I placed the Saurus first and in the middle of the field, well that was silly. Especially since that meant they were smack dab in the middle of a patch of rough ground. That mistake would cost me dearly.



I put my Cold Ones on one flank so I could use the hill to shield them from missle fire. In retrospect I probably would have been better served to let them take fire since the Sun Standard makes them much more difficult to hit, and they have an impressive save. They took not one shot from a missle weapon all game. That was 40 wasted points. On the other hand, they were at full strength until their last battle, so maybe I played them exactly right.






Here is what the dark elf deploment looked like.






Here is what my setup ended up looking like.






Lizardmen Turn 1:



My magic phase was not spectacular. I managed to cast Portent of Far on one of my Stegadons. The other three spells I attempted failed to cast.




My skinks were out of range so they did not fire. Both Stegadons missed.








Dark Elf Turn 1:




His Hydra moved forward just far enough to be out of charge range, nothing else moved.




He did a lot of firing. He chewed through all 10 of my screening skink unit. He also killed 3 Saurus from my block of 21 leaving me with 18 and 1 less rank bonus.








Lizardmen Turn 2:
I again trudge forward slowly. My remaining skink unit spreads out to act as screen against the predictable hail of bolts from the dark elf line. The only other notable is my Cold Ones marching to within 3" of the enemy War Hydra. My Saurus Scar-Veteran Beday Pr'sntslay'r leading them. I realized after moving them there that "hey, that is the perfect spot to get smacked by some stanky Hydra-breath. Oh well, this was not the worst play I made all game and kept my Cold Ones out of the cross-hairs for most of the enemy army.




Magic is great this time around. I start off rolling 3 dice to cast the Lore of Heavens shield against shooting spell. I rolled snake eyes on 3 dice. Even with the other die added in I would not have made the total I would need for the spell, but the double 1s made that irrelevant. I roll an 8 on the miscast table and take a wound with one of my skink priests. The worst of it though is the magic phase ends when I still have 7 casting dice to use.





Shooting is no better than last turn. No skinks in range and I am not expecting to hit with my Stegadons needing 6s.









Dark Elf Turn 2:
He announces a charge against my Cold Ones with his War Hydra. After looking around to make sure his fellow Cold One Riders are game (aka taking a Fear test because Terror - Fear = Fear) Beday Pr'sntslay'r steadies himself and receives the charge.




On the other side of the field, the Master of Assasins appears in front of my Skinks, killing one immediately and forcing the rest to form up for combat, practically eliminating them as a shielding unit.

End of any attempt at real reporting

Unfortunately, I let this sit too long and do not recall well what actually happened in the battle. So from here on it is just going to be comments about particular details.


When the Hydra charged my Cold Ones the battle went like this: the hydra attacks hitting 3 or 4 times, wounding I think 2, and in the end all wounds were saved. The Beastmasters fared about the same. My Cavalry did a couple of wounds to the Hydra which he regenerated. In the end, one of my Cold Ones killed a Beastmaster. I outnumbered the Hydra, had a standard, and caused a wound. He lost the combat and broke. I pursued. I rolled first: WHAT!?! 3 on 3d6? Why me? Then I saw his roll: a 2 and a 1! That is ridiculous, I rolled nothing but ones and still caught his fleeing Hydra. The brief reference to a name for my Saurus Scar-Veteran above is a joke about this battle. The Hydra was a b-day gift from myself and another guy to Fixeddice. This is the first battle I played against him and I absolutely demolished it. To be fair, I had around 500 points in this battle to his 175, but it was still somewhat of a shock. Below is a picture of the dice from the pursuit roll.





This is a cool shot of my Cold Ones versus his Dreadlord on Manticore. I had broken off my Hero to try and get him into combat more quickly than the other Cold Ones were going to be able to. That turned out to be a mistake as his general charged, rolled a 6 to wound and had Killing Blow. He then overran into my Cold Ones.





This is the field at the end of the Dark Elf turn 2.



This is the field at the end of the Lizardmen turn 3.






My Cold Ones actually fared pretty well against his Dreadlord. I lost 3 in the first round, but held up because I only lost the combat by 1.





My Saurus that were in the middle who were supposed to be on the side got slaughtered. The broke and were overrun by his Cold Ones. It was not even close.





Following his overrun of my Saurus I charged his Cold Ones in the flank with my Stegadon. He ran not wanting to take the hit without the benefit of his shields.





I knew I couldn't wound his general, so I was directing my attacks at his Manticore. Had I remembered all of the rules, this would have been brilliant. As it was, it kept his general from being even more impactful.

I killed his manticore removing the part of his general that caused Terror. This meant that my Cold Ones causing Fear actually mattered. Since the general only had a unit strength of 1 and my Cold One Champion had a unit strength of 2 I outnumbered him. Since neither of us could get through the other's save, that was the only modifier on the combat resolution and I was winning the rounds of combat. Fear causes enemies you outnumber and beat in combat to auto-break barring a roll of insane courage. Barring another roll like the Hydra pursuit, my Cold One champion would have killed his general.







This is him breaking my Stegadon a turn later than he should have. (I tried to play the rules the way I thought they should be, but they would not let me. Oh well...) He caught steggy the next turn. He also finished off my last Cold One and killed a Skink priest.



Final Thoughts:

Rules:
We definitely still have a long way to go with knowing the relevant rules. I forgot at one point that any monster mount who's rider(s) is/are killed has to test using its own leadership. It took his Cold Ones an extra turn to break my Stegadon. I forgot about Fear against his general because his Manticore caused Terror effectively making it irrelevant... until I killed his Manty. I did not realize the power of rough ground until this battle.

Play:
I do not think I played particularly well or poorly in this battle. I definitely made some major mistakes like sending a lone Stegadon against a massive block of Cold Ones, but I also effectively protected my Cold Ones from fire, guessed the range I would need on Deliverance of Itza perfectly every time, and did an OK job of screening with my skinks.

MVP:
There is no question my MVP for this battle was Lord Kroak. He kept my Temple Guard from having to take a couple of panic tests, but he also leveled the enemy's firing line. He scored almost all of my points by himself. A spell that can hit everything on the field at S4 2d6 times is quite impressive, particularly against elves who all have T3. I will take Kroak any time I can against an Elven opponent.

Winner:
I lost by a marginal victory, but had I remembered a few key things I might have won by the same. If I did indeed kill his general, that is another 180+ for me, and 180 that he did not get for killing the last of my Cold Ones. Of course, had I remembered the Ridden Monster leadership thing, he could have taken down my Stegadon 1-2 turns sooner and maybe had time to take out my Temple Guard and Kroak.

All in all this was a very fun battle, and I am really looking forward to the next one, when hopefully I will do a better job.

Edit:
This is the image of Shadowblade that Fixeddice was referring to. I think this was one of my favorite parts of the battle. I got to show this pic around quite a bit and got many kudos. :)

Dark Elves vs Vampire Counts 750 points

Here's my first battle report! w00t w00t! Everybody dance now....!

It was April 11th, 2009. It was warm in the garage....too warm....I, kennyb, a noble druchii (dark elf), could sense a .....sense of dread. I could smell mold, like grave mold. I put on deoderant and the smell lessened. But then I could smell....mustard? I wiped my lip and the smell subsided, but that allowed me to smell the gas. Mustard gas? No..... Drew gas! Or Rick (Space Monkey) gas? The difference is minimal at most. Must be time for the battle!

Today it would be my 751 point Druchii force against the evil and ignoble Chris' 740 point Vampire Counts. I am going into this battle with a great fear knowing that only my "General Malus" and my Sorceress will be able to harm his ethereal units, and also Malus is most likely the only model in the army capable of taking out his characters in melee combat. That is a precarious and unenviable position to be in, let me tell you! My heart is racing before the battle begins and I'm perspiring furiously. Oh....nope. My nose was running and I wiped it inadvertantly on my arm, making it feel like perspiration until it dried, so I threw it at Chris. Ha! My weakness suddenly turned into a weapon, let's see how I do in the battle:

Here are the armies:

Chris's Grave Stenchy Ignoble Vampire Counts

10 Skeleton Warriors at 8 pts ea : 80/80 sub-total

10 Crypt Ghouls at 8 pts ea : 80/160 sub-total

3 Cairn Wraiths at 50 pts ea +Banshee upgrade at 25 pts : 175/335 sub-total

3 Cairn Wraiths at 50 pts ea +Banshee upgrade at 25 pts : 175/510 sub-total

1 Wight King at 75 pts : 75/585 sub-total

1 Vampire at 100 pts w/Lord of the Dead Ability at 15 pts, and Blood Drinker Magic Sword at 40 pts : 155/740 sub-total

For a grand total of 740 pts. Should have had another Skele there Chris!

kennyb's Noble Druchii Valorous Defenders of the Rightful King Malekith

13 Spearmen at 6 pts ea w/Shields at +1 pt per model : 91/91 sub-total

10 Crossbowmen at 10 pts ea : 100/191 sub-total

10 Crossbowmen at 10 pts ea : 100/291 sub-total

1 Malus Darkblade, Scion of Hag Graef : 275/566 sub-total

1 Lvl 2 Sorceress at 135 pts w/Sacrificial Dagger at 25 pts and the Pearl of Infinite Bleakness at 25 pts : 155/751 sub-total

So to open we rolled to see who would place the first piece of terrain. I won. I rolled a 9 for type which is a fence. I placed it towards closer to the side of the table I was standing on and near the table edge, hoping to use it for cover for my archers or sorceress. Chris rolled a river and placed it near the edge of the table to his left. I rolled another fence, and placed it next to the first fence leading further onto the battlefield. He passed. I rolled my final roll....a forest. Bleh. I placed it on the left table edge near me to try and keep it out of the battle basically. We rolled for terrain scatter and the items moved further into the field and a little bit more towards the side I was standing on. Nice.

Rolling for magic Chris rolled high for his spell (6 I think) and exchanged it for Raise Dead. I rolled a 1 and a 6, so it was decided for me completely! Luckily, I always end up with Chillwind anyway and Black Horror seemed like a good spell for this battle since he had some weak Strength units and it uses the large round template. Sweet! (Chillwind is a 24" D6 S4 Magic Missile that keeps a unit taking casualties from shooting in it's next turn {5+ to cast}, and Black Horror let's you place the large template anywhere within 18", and all models TOUCHED must pass a Strength test or suffer a wound, no armour saves allowed, and any unit suffering a casualty must take a panic test [no good against undead, but oh well!] {11+ to cast}. Thankfully, with the Power of Darkness spell, Druchii Sorcery (can use any amount of casting dice no matter what level the sorceress is), and my Sacrificial Dagger I figured I would get them both cast every magic phase, and he couldn't dispel that much power. We shall see.....

I won the roll to pick table edge first, so I chose the edge I was already standing on. The terrain placement gave me a good place to hole up my sorceress AND my archers behind fences, and the trees could actually shield Malus until the enemy got close enough for me to charge, at which point I planned on working my way out of the trees and flanking. I was hoping to riddle his troops with arrows as they advanced, from behind my fortified position, but I forgot about ethereals.

Chris won the roll to choose who placed first and chose to place the first unit. He placed his Wraith units in the front, followed by his Skeletons and Ghouls, then placed his Vampire with the Skele's and his Wight with his Ghouls.

In the meantime, I placed my x-bowmen, then my 2nd x-bowmen, then my spearmen, all in position to run up to the fences and blow him away. Then I placed my Sorceress with my Spearmen and Malus on my left flank in the trees, about 2" in.

We rolled to see who went first, me having a +1 from finishing my setup first (my 3 units + 2 characters to his 4 units + 2 characters). He rolled a....1 and I rolled a 6. Pretty decisive! I chose to go first, thinking I would advance as quickly as possible into x-bow range and hail him with black fetched bolts.

Dark Elf Turn 1

Movement Phase

I advance all 3 units straight ahead toward the enemy as a noble Druchii would, and it just so happens there was a defensive position directly in my path. Fate is kind to the true hearted. :)

Malus comes out of the trees so I am in a better position to charge when the time comes. I didn't want to get stuck in the trees at a critical moment.

Magic Phase

I get 4 power dice per turn, 2 for my lvl 2 Sorceress and 2 for my army pool. My first casting intent is to cast Black Horror on his approaching Wraiths. I roll 3 dice to cast and achieve a 10. Perfect! I love to kill my own troops so I do. I sacrifice a Spearman (6pts!) to roll an additional die and roll a 3 to bring the total to 13. That's sufficient so Chris rolls all 3 of his Dispel Dice. He rolls a 10. Success! I place the center of the template at 18" and it reaches....nothing! Oh well, it was close, and he used all his Dispel Dice. I cast Chillwind towards the same Wraith unit using my last Power Die. I roll a 3. Yes! I murder, I mean "Sacrifice", another Spearman and roll an additional 3 for a total of 6. Success! I roll a 3 for quantity of hits. 1 for each model in the unit. Fail the to Wound on the first Wraith. Success on the Banshee. Success on the second Wraith. Not bad. For 12 pts of sacrifice 2 spells that would have failed were successful, and ended up doing 2 wounds. I'll take that any day of the week!

Shooting Phase

I state my intent for all 40 of my Bolts (20 Repeater x-bows) to fire at the Wraith units. It is mentioned that I certainly may, but that THEY ARE ETHEREAL SO IT DOESN'T MATTER. Ouch. That's going to sting for a few turns! Half my army is useless until the Wraith Units are decimated. Oops. lol

Vampire Counts Turn 1

Movement Phase

Chris marched all of his army directly towards me.

Magic Phase

Chris attempts Invocation of Nehek with 2 Power Dice. Rolls a 4 (3+1). I roll 2 Dispel Dice and score a 5 (3+2). Great rolling from both of us. An average roll of 2.25 on a d6 (total of 9 rolled on 4 dice: 9/4=2.25). Chris attemps Raise Dead with his last Power Die and scores a...1. That brings our average rolls for this phase to a whopping 2. lol. Better his phase than mine!

Shooting Phase

Chris attempts to use his Banshee howl but is out of range.

Dark Elf Turn 2

The first thing I do is invoke Tz'Arkan with Malus. For the uninitiated, Malus is

M WS BS S T W I A Ld

5---6--5-4-3-2-7-3-9

Invoking Tz'Arkan gives +1 WS, +1S, +2T, +2I, +1 Ld, and Frenzy, with a result that looks like

M WS BS S T W I A Ld

5--7---5-5-5-2-9-4-10

A very nice stat line if I do say so myself. :)

The main reason I did it is for the Frenzy. I didn't want to fail a charge, and becoming frenzied lets the game take over that for me.

Movement Phase

Malus is within range (14" charge range on Cold One) of the left hand unit of Wraiths and so must charge them. Chris declares his reaction will be to stand and whimper (Banshee Wail). His wail is a 2d6+2 roll against my Ld of 10, with the difference being the # of wounds Malus will take with no armour save allowed. Potent indeed! He rolled a 7 I think, for a total of 9. No wounds! Im-potent perhaps...the poor Banshee must have had a sore throat or strained vocal cord...

I moved my archers on my left flank back 2 and 1/2" (turned 180, walked 2 1/2", and turned 180 back around) directly away from the Wraith unit and my right flank arhcers 3 3/4" (turn 180 and walk away) directly away from the other Wraith unit, hoping to stay out of reach of that horrible wail! I left my Sorceress where she was because I needed her on the offensive to have any hope of survival, seeing as her and Malus are my only models capable of even damaging the Wraiths in this army build.

Magic Phase

I roll 3d6 to attempt Black Horror again, and this time roll a 12 (6+5+1). I wanted to sacrifice another Spearman but since I rolled a 1 already, and the spell is successful, I didn't want to chance a miscast. So I let him live. But I did lurch at the intended winner (victim some might say) causing him to yelp in fear. The other Spearmen thought it was a Banshee Wail and almost ran him through, but caught themselves just in time. Chris rolled all 3 of his Dispel Dice and scored an 11 (5+4+2). Yes! The template covered his entire Wraith unit so all will suffer the wrath of the Black Horror! They only have Strength 3 so I figure 2 will wound meaning 1 should die! The first Wraith rolls a 5. Yes! 1 Wound. The Banshee rolls....a 3. No! It survives. But 1 more wound to the other Wraith would kill it... he rolls....another 3! NO! Oh well. 1 Wound is better than none!

I roll my final Power Die to cast Chillwind at the same unit again, and roll a 4. I sacrifice the wailing Spearman and roll a 6 to bring the total to 10. Success! I roll a 3 for the quanity of hits again, which is definitely acceptable. Roll to wound the first Wraith (needing 3's I think), a 5! Success. The first Wraith is DEAD! Roll to wound the Banshee...a 1. Epic fail. Roll to wound the last Wraith, a 3! Yes! 2 more wounds and 2 dead wraiths...2....dead....wraiths.....I'm sure there is a more "accurate" way of deading a dead, but hey, they are epic dead now! Unfortunately, the Banshee is the thing I'm most afraid of and the last man standing in the unit! Oh well. No complaint, just a healthy dose of fear!

Shooting Phase

1 unit of my x-bowmen fired 20 shots at his Skeletons that were exposed by the reduced size of the wraith unit. Needing 6's to hit, I rolled : 2 1's, 2 3's, 6 4's, 8 5's, and 2 (2!) 6's. Bleh. To wound, 2 4's. Both successful! He needs 6's to save and rolled...2 5's! Yes! 2 hits and 2 wounds. The to hit ratio wasn't great, but 100% hit-to-kill is awesome!

Close Combat

Malus rolls 4 attacks all against the Banshee (I really am scared of them!) needing 3's to hit. 2 hit. Re-rolled the 2 misses with Eternal Hatred and scored 1 more hit for a total of 3. 3 rolls to wound needing 2's = 2 successful. Re-roll failed to wound with Warpsword of Khaine and it's successful. He killed the Banshee! YES!! Go Malus! (I really, really, really, have high hopes for Malus and this is a great start for his career with me!)

Chris' Wraiths roll 6 attacks needing 5's to hit (WS3 vs WS7): no hits! Sweet! So Combat Result is he had 3 models at start giving him unit strength 3 to my 2, giving him +1. I got +2 for causing 2 wounds, winning by 1. 1 Wraith takes a wound.

Vampire Counts Turn 2

Movement Phase

Right Banshee moves 6" towards Sorceress. Right Skele's move in a wheel towards Malus's right flank. Vampire led unit on left wheels to move past the Wraith unit between them and Malus.

Magic Phase

Chris attempts Raise Dead with 2 Power Dice and scores a 7 (5+2). I roll all 3 of my Dispel Dice and score an 11 (6+3+2). Nice! He attemps Invocation of Nehek with his last Power Die and rolls....a 2! Awesome (for me)!!!

Shooting Phase

Cris's remaining Banshee draws a deep breath, aims at Malus, and...sneezed! She shouldn't have eaten that snake and maybe she wouldn't have sneezed Snake Eyes! Malus is INVINCIBLE!!

Close Combat

Malus's initiative trumps the Wraiths badly. I roll his 4 attacks and hit 2 needing only 3's. :(

I roll to wound needing 2's and roll a 1 and a 2. Re-roll failed roll to wound with Warpsword and score another 2. Good enough! 2 wounds kills 1 Wraith and wounds the other. 2nd Wraith hits me one time but does not wound. Wraiths lost the combat by 2 so the remaining Wraith dies! Malus Wins! Go Malus, go, go, go Malus!

I believe the battle is decided at this point. So far, I have done 275 pts to the Vampires' army with 2 characters, and my only losses are from the 3 sacrifices I made. I am in positon to flank the Skeleton unit containing the Vampire, my sorceress is free to go toe-to-toe with the final Banshee who is down to 1 wound, and my archers are going to unleash. However.... :

At this point we have another engagement to attend and so leave with the intent to come back and finish. I was unable to come back, but Rick (Space Monkcy) finished it out for me and won. Cris miscast with his Vampire and his head blew up, Malus finished off the remaining Banshee, and the x-bowmen and sorceress ate through the Skele's and Ghouls. My plan was to send Malus against the Vampire unit (he had a flank attack, so he had 4 attacks with re-rolls to hit and to wound, and his Cold One Spite had 2 attacks with re-rolls to hit, so I believe I would have squashed the unit single handedly and in a manner befitting the Which King's personal champion), have the sorceress finish off the Banshee and then move on to the Core units, and have the x-bowmen eat up anything they could see. Either way, I don't think Cris had a chance at this point.

A fun time for me, but Cris had been up all night working on his army and so came half asleep, and probably won't remember any of this. rofl

Dwarfs versus Wood Elfs pre-game nonsense

What a day. I have been looking forward to this game since last month's devastation of Josh's Orcs at the hands of my heroic and gorgeous Wood Elf shooting army of doom.  The humiliation of waiting 14 years to play a Wardancer unit only to see them routed by a crap unit notwithstanding, the game was a lot of fun. Warhammer usually is. Plus, with the new lights Rick installed and the felt he and I covered the tables with, it should look spectacular.

So I have been painting like mad and spent a good deal of time making sure there would be competitive armies for the Goblins, a couple Dwarf armies, a Wood Elf army, a fun and competitive Vampire count army. So I got the lists all together, gathered up all the stuff and set out to pick up Chad. 

Then I returned home to pick up the army lists. And headed off to pick up Chad.

Then returned home to pick up the army I forgot to bring. Then headed off to pick up Chad.

Then turned back to get the new scenery I had purchased. 

AAAAAAAAAggggggggghhhhhhhhhh! Not a good start.

Well, knew we would be having pizza, so did not eat breakfast. Well, got there late, things were a bit discombobulated. Never did get anything ordered. No big deal...except when all was said and done I would go from 2:30 yesterday afternoon until 9:00 tonight without eating. D'oh!

Well, anyway, we started off with a good game of Heroscape. Got some nice pictures, hopefully will get my camera issues resolved soon and get them up.

Unfortunately, the one thing I did not get resolved was table space issues. So we matched up Kenneth and his Dark Elf army against Josh and the Goblins, Phillip and his lizardmen against Rick and the Dwarf army (with Chad studying the game under Rick) and Kevin's new Ogre Kingdom army against Chris and the Vampire Counts. That left me without a game.

Now, to be fair Rick offered to sit out but I could not bring myself to play when someone else was sitting out so I was just going to take pictures and notes of all the games.

Oh, remember the numerous things I forgot to bring with me this morning? Well...I also forgot to recharge my camera batteries after Friday's Blazer game so I essentially had no batteries left. Just not meant to be my day.

I mostly watched Kevin and Chris. I explained the way I built the Vampire army to work; the Cairn Wraiths working as a protective screen to allow the Skeletons and Grave Guard to get into close combat without taking a lot of damage, plus carry Mannfred the Acolyte with them and let his Sword of Unholy Power do its work.

Unfortunately, he did not quite get what I was saying and put his screening unit off on the left, leaving his Grave Guard w/Mannfred unit exposed to the Leadbelchers of Kevin. With only 1000 point armies, this was a great risk; should the leadbelchers do enough damage to cause a break test and the test fail, he conceivably could lose almost half his army to the opening volley, a totally unnecessary risk.

That is why these learning games are good, because I could freely mention the strategy upgrade and reasoning behind it.

Meanwhile, Kevin had a pretty good set-up and won the first turn. His Leadbelchers and Gut-dudes all rumbled forward. Unfortunately for him, the Leadbelchers were about 1/4" out of range and his magic phase saw either failure to cast or else dispelled by Chris.

Then Chris was able to correct his set-up. He got the Ethereal Cairn Wraiths in front of his units so they would be the only target for the Leadbelchers. That was essentially the game as it turned out.

The next turn for Kev was more maneuvering and failed Magic. Then Chris charged his Cairn Wraiths into the Leadbelchers. Open up with the Banshee Ghostly Howl and soon the Leadbelchers were gone without ever getting to fire their guns. 

That was the way the game went; Kevin had nothing that could hurt the Cairn Wraiths who rampaged through every unit he had. Ultimately, one unit of Zombies Chris managed to raise was slain by one of Kevin's units, giving him 50 points, the total he ended with. At the end of the game he had fleeing Gnoblars and 1 character (75 point character) on the table while Chris lost a total of 4 skeletons. Brutal.

Lesson: Always, always, always have some way of dealing with ethereal creatures. That one unit did ALL the damage, 925 points. 

Meanwhile, the Lizardmen/Dwarf battle was almost as bad. A major tactical error saw 2 of the 3 cannons covered up by Thunderer units; the army he decided to use had 2 10 man Thunderer units (150 points each), 3 cannons (90 points each), a Master Engineer, and a 17 man Warrior regiment meant to surround the Thane. In theory, nobody in the entire army would move until the Warriors charged late in the game. However, he missed that part of the design and planned to move his Thunderers out of the way of the Cannons. However, an all-shooting army that sees 33% of its shooters unable to shoot (Move or Fire) is going to struggle. 

Phillip put a skirmishing screen of skinks all the way across the front. Perfect. Moved forward, fired. Rinse, repeat, and roll to a massacre victory which was only helped when 2 of the cannons blew up in the same turn. *Sigh*. Poor Rick. No luck paired with sub-optimal starting position meant disaster.

And in the third game, Josh also missed part of the army design. I tried to explain that he needed to put his Spider Riders spread 10 wide, then his Archers 20 wide, then all his hand to hand units, meant to move forward, firing as they went, and allow him to numerically overwhelm the badly outnumbered Dark Elf army. Instead he bunched the Spider Riders on one wing 5 wide, the archers about 10 wide, and spread his hand-to-hand units all across the table. Worse yet, he put his general off on his right wing.

This allowed Kenneth to charge his best unit into the unsupported, unready for close combat Spider riders, shoot one of his 40 spearmen units to ribbons on their way across the field, and never outnumber the Dark Elf army. Even with a 200 point advantage, that set-up meant he was way behind. 

I almost cried on the turn he charged his remaining spearmen into the Dark Elf quarrelers and instead of flanking them with his stone troll, instead charged the stone troll solo into a unit of Dark Elf Corsairs. 

Kenneth and Josh thought it was luck that the Stone Troll died in turn one; nope. Not even close. There were 3+ ranks of Corsairs. He had a +2 for that, +1 for outnumbering, +1 for Standard bearer. Before it even started he had a +4 to his combat resolution. He only had 3 attacks. Even if he killed with all 3 of them and took no return wounds, he would have to take a break test on Leadership 4 (out of range of the general) with a -1. The troll was dying that turn. 

This is not taking anything from Kenneth. He set up his army better and moved them better. Josh was in deep trouble from the word go. 

Overall, looked like everyone had fun, so that is a good thing. Shortly will post report on my battle with Chad.

Warhammer Game 1

 

The time has come for the first game. Representing the mighty, heroic, and extremely well-dressed, handsome dwarven army (pictured above) would be the mighty, heroic, and extremely well-dressed, handsome Rick and Drew. Rick took, from left to right, the Warriors,  the General, and the Troll-Slayer. Drew got the  cannon, the Thunderers, and the Miners. The plan was simple. Protect the wings with the fighters, shoot their dangerous stuff with the cannon and thunderers.

 Opposing the valiant but badly outnumbered Dwarves would be the foul-smelling, craven, malicious goblin hordes which was ironic since they were being played by the foul-smelling, craven, malicious Kenneth, Phillip and Josh (not pictured). Ha, just kidding. They are not malicious. Again pictured left to right, Kenneth took the Night Goblin Spearmen and Shaman. He put the shaman in the unit for protection.

Phillip had the fast-moving Spider Riders and the Night Goblin Archers. Josh got the Troll, The Goblin General, and another unit of Night Goblin Spearmen.

GOBLIN TURN 1
 

Kenneth checks out his unit statistics.

The Spider Riders marched forward their full move. The King's Wall was an unfortunate obstacle that would slow them a bit. As it turned out, that time it slowed them would possibly determine the outcome of the entire battle. Actually, the entire Goblin Army moved forward at a full march. They clearly wanted to get into hand to hand combat as quickly as possible so they could use their superior numbers to overwhelm the Dwarves. 

Here they Come!

The Shaman cast Burning Hands on himself as the Dwarves were unable to dispell. Everyone was out of range so the Goblins ended their first turn.

DWARF TURN ONE

We moved both wings forward at a fast march. We wanted our hand-to-hand fighters to get in contact with the Goblins as soon as possible. We figured to deal more casualties in close combat than the Goblins, though their numbers could prove problematic. We would simply count on our gunmen to whittle down their numbers. The Thunderers and Cannon cannot move and fire so they stayed put. The Cannon took aim at the front rank of the Spider Riders. Unfortunately, needing 2+ to kill them, I rolled snake-syes. Then the Thunderers took a bead on the Spider Riders and unleashed their mighty hand-guns.

With deadly precision, they mowed down fully half of the Spider Riders, leaving just 5 alive. Fortunately for the Spider Riders, they were within range of the General. His added Leadership let them pass the test.

GOBLIN TURN 2

The Spider Riders thought about charging the Miners but chose to bypass them in favor of getting ready to charge the Thunders. In my opinion, this was a slight tactical error. If they charged they would pin down the Miners, letting the Night Goblin Spearmen charge in with an advantage, and also keep them from getting shot at by the Thunderers and Cannon. Then again, he did need to dispense with the Thunderers. This was certainly a bad moment for the Thunderers as they are really effective when shooting...not so much hand-to-hand. If the Spider Riders reached them, they were likely to flee the field.

 

Using the Spider Riders for Cover, the Night Goblin Spearman advanced, ready to charge the Miners on their own.

The Night Goblin Archers advanced to the King's Wall while Drool the Troll and General Eargrabber advanced towards their opposite numbers. They fired on Norry Trollslayer, but the hero laughed off their hail of arrows, taking no damage.

DWARVEN TURN 2

Again the Dwarven fighters moved forward as quickly as possible. Meanwhile, the mighty Dwarf Cannon roared again. This time the Night Goblin Spearmen lost a couple members. Again the Thunderers fired. This time they slew just 3 Spider Riders but, devastated by the carnage, the2 remaining Spider Riders turned tail and fled. 

With the Spider Riders fleeing, it opened the Night Goblin Archers to the fury of the Thunderers in future turns, at least until they closed with the Miners in furious hand-to-hand combat. But that was several turns away if it was to happen at all. 

GOBLIN TURN 3

The Night Goblins moved into close range with the Miners but were unable to charge. The Troll, however, did move into contact with Norry. Meanwhile, using the little-known "Drew needs to remember and explain the rules better" clause, the Night Goblin Archers expanded their front and unleashed a mighty hail of arrows at the Thunderers. 

Having already seen the ineffectual nature of their bowmanship, the Thunderers laughed off the hail of arrows...at least, until they noticed two of their number laying on the ground, shot dead. The Goblins, heartened by this turn of events, raised a mighty cheer.

DWARF TURN 3

On the right wing, the Warriors charged into the Night Goblin Spearman while on the left the Miners charged the Shaman-strengthened Night Goblin Spearmen. The Warriors fought the Spearmen to a draw, but the fight between Troll and Troll-Slayer went very poorly for the dwarves. With a mighty effort, Drool dispatched Norry, giving the Goblins a mighty boost in morale. This was offset, however, as the Miners took not one casualty and ran the Night Goblins off the table. The Mighty Cannon belched forth flame but another roll of Snake-eyes meant it again did no damage. The Thunders killed a couple Night Goblin Archers. Things were looking good for the Dwarves.

GOBLIN TURN 4

Having dispatched Norry the Troll-slayer, Drool had to choose between helping his General and helping the Night Goblins. Seeing a chance to strike the Warriors in the flank, he charged into battle against them.This proved to be a brilliant move. Seeing the overwhelming horde in front of them, with the Troll-Slayer next to them, and their mighty General being matched blow for blow by the Goblin General, the Dwarven Warriors began to flee. With howls of delight, the Night Goblin Spearman pursued and slew them all. The tide had turned as the badly outnumbered dwarves saw their main unit crushed into tiny little soup bones which no doubt would find their way into Goblin Stew-pots post-battle.

DWARF TURN 4

The Miners moved towards the Archers, the Thunderers shot at the Archers, the Cannon took out a couple Archers.

Goblin Turn 5

The Troll charged in to attack the Dwarf General. Hand to hand, the General slew the Goblin Troll but was in turn killed by the Goblin General. On the Dwarf Right, the Night Goblin Spearmen wheeled to face the Cannon while the Archers retreated from the Miners. Their arrows flew in, killing two Miners, but the Miners stood resolute, unwilling to retreat.

The Night Goblin Archers continue their retreat, firing as they back up from the Miners.

Meanwhile, the Spearmen engaged the Cannoneers. Expecting an easy victory, they were unable to slay even a single Cannonneer while taking 3 casualties of their own. Somehow they passed the break test.

DWARF TURN 5

The Thunderers looked for a new target, the Archers having retreated out of range. There was one...the Goblin General. He went down under a hail of bullets.

GOBLIN TURN 6

Again the Cannoneers held firm. The Archers took the Miners down to just 2, but they again refused to flee. 

DWARF TURN 6

The Thunderers turned to face the Night Goblin Spearmen whenever they inevitably broke through the 3 cannoneers.

The last two miners charged into the archers and began hewing them down. Frightened by the ferocity of these two miners, the archers began to flee but were run down and slain to the last Goblin.

At this point, technically, the game should have been over according to the "official" rules. However, we had lost track of turns. Also, we typically play to the bitter end. So...

GOBLIN TURN 7

The last remaining Spearmen finally killed the stalwart cannoneers. Unfortunately, that put them in the open, facing the might of the Thunders.

DWARF TURN 7

With a smile on their face, the last 8 Thunderers unleashed the fury of their Handguns. After some abominable rolling against the archers for most of the game, they were ready to rectify their ineptitude. All 8 hit, 6 wounded, and the Night Goblins began to flee. With just 5 left, the battle was over.

The only survivors are pictured below.

 As it was, I think the plan Rick and I had was pretty good. We controlled the center of the field, used our advantages and minimized their advantages as they achieved numerical superiority but that was offset but us doing more casualties in the actual combat...which is how the two armies are set up.

This battle hung by a thread several times. If the Cannon actually killed Spider Riders or Spearmen on the two times I did zero wounds by rolling snake-eyes, or the time it mis-fired when facing the Spearmen at the very end, it could have been a rout. 

Conversely, had the Miners not saved every hit laid on them by the spearmen and survived to reach the archers, the archers could have won it. Had the Spearmen gotten through the cannoneers on their first or second try, they could have charged the Thunderers. In hand to hand they would have probably run the Thunderers off the table. 

Ultimately, it was a close game and hopefully a fun one for all involved. Except for the Troll taking out the Trollslayer in one turn, basically every break went the way of the Dwarves. One or two reversals and the Goblins could have won. 

One thing I forgot, though it would have mattered in one combat, was the Spears. Spearmen can use 2 ranks every turn when they don't charge. Since I charged them with my Miners, they would have had an additional 5 attacks or so which could have changed the outcome of that attack. That was an error on my part.

I think if the roles were reversed, I would have done a few things different. The King's Wall delayed the Spider Riders long enough to allow them to be destroyed before they could ever come to grips with the Dwarf units. If I were to deploy the Goblins, I would run the Archers to the Wall in a 16 wide group to make it tough for the Dwarves to shoot at anyone but them. With the General hanging close to them, their leadership tests would be on an 8, they are a large unit so would not break the first 2 or 3 turns. The Spider Riders and Night Goblin Spearmen would be placed clear of the wall so they could move as quickly as possible once they got past the wall. 

Also, I might leave one side of the field clear. Dwarves are very slow, so if I could overload one side of the field and effectively take half the enemy force out of commission, this would allow me to get some flanking action in. No matter how tough a dwarf unit, if faced with 2 units of Spearmen packed 5 rows deep, one on their flank, that dwarf unit is going to run. Pursuing the Miners would bring the Spearmen close to the Thunderers. Once in Hand to hand, they could roll up the flank and keep the Cannon from being a factor. Of course, if the Dwarves adopt the same strategy, I would be in trouble as the flanking roles could be reversed.

I would also tend to keep at least 4 ranks deep by 4 wide rather than going wider but shallower. That would give me the max advantage in hand to hand. Even though the Dwarves are going to do more casualties in almost every exchange, the depth would matter. Let's say the Dwarves do 3 casualties and the goblins 1. That plus 2 will be overcome by 2 rank bonuses. If I still have 3 rank bonuses, it will be the DWARVES taking the break test. So numbers might be best used by making the most ranks possible. Or I might even, in the future, be tempted to combine the 2 units into one massive unite that could go about 8 wide by 5 deep. 

I will experiment a bit with the Goblins. They are the exact opposite of my preferred style...which is a few tough guys who are lethal. I am not great at winning through numbers. 

Conversely, the Dwarves are not my style either. I do not like relying on War Machines like cannons. The idea that my guess was pretty irrelevant was frustrating. At one point I guessed 1" in front of the cannon, rolled an 8 on the Artillery Die, and watched my cannonball sail harmlessly over the Night Goblins. The next turn it misfired. Then the Spearmen charged it and the jig was up. I am not a huge fan of something that can add 2,4, 6, 8, or 10" to my guess...if it doesn't misfire entirely. You not only have to be good at estimating the distance from you to the target, you also have to be somewhat fortunate in your rolls to injure anyone. 

Fortunately, the Thunderers are pure awesome. I like them. Great range, decent chance to hit, good chance to wound. Deadly. Actually, except the War Machines, very slow foot speed,  and lack of armor (other than the Miners), the Dwarves fit me pretty well...:-) I am a Bretonnian General at heart, so I will avoid playing them for a while.