Secure The Area - MESBG Battle Companies Game

We got another game in in our ongoing Battle Companies campaign. This time we replayed the  Secure the Area scenario (see the first play of this here).

Apologies for the briefer report, various family commitments means this took several weeks to finish writing up.

Set Up

We used the gauntlet as the objective again (another Gauntlet? There must be an Infinity of them).  We set the objective just at the edge of a hill, though on reflection, placing it in terrain that was hard for cavalry to access would have made for a more exciting end game.

All troops suffering from Old Battle Wounds were, as always, fine to fight; one day that's going to hit me hard, but "today is not that day".

Opening Moves

The Fiefdoms had Priority, which worked against them as the Harad troops entered the field very much in response to the Fiefdoms deployment.  Most of both sides appeared in the first turn, with the remainder arriving next turn.  Archery was pretty much a non-event for the first few turns.

Both sides' vanguards arrive

 

Action close to the edge as the two leaders spot each other and charge as soon as possible

Arbea clashes with a Blackroot Vale Archer and a Man-at-Arms

Clash of the leaders!

Khamsa's charge sees to the Clansman

Going for the Objective

As the battle hots up around Qayid and the Knight, the Fiefdoms' troops make for the objective.

(I must admit that I often forget this sort of game winning detail (I play orcs!), as was the case here.  My son was out-thinking me again.)

Khamsa, his work done on the flank, heads for more targets near the arcade

After some ferocious sparring, Qayid fells the Knight and Khamsa downs the Axeman of Lossarnarch.  

Elsewhere the Fiefdoms troops steal ever closer to the objective.

The End Phase

Realising that although I'd taken out the Fiefdoms' leader, their troops controlled the objective, I sent my best troops, Qayid and Khamsa, as I'd lost Shawish earlier, to try an take it from them.

The Harad hose race for the objective

Khamsa thins out the Men-at-Arms while Sabea tries and fails to remove the Blackroot Vale Archer claiming the objective

Qayid and Khamsa close in on the Fiefdoms defenders

Qayid rides up to the gauntlet while Khamsa removes the Ranger, is it enough for Harad?

With the Fiefdoms' broken, and Harad not far behind, the battle ended.  Had Qayid's desperate charge been enough or had he been distracted long enough?

When we checked the battlefield and the victory conditions, both sides had two models within 3" of the objective, so it was a draw! 

Aftermath

Despite causing more casualties to the Fiefdoms, they scraped a draw.  Curses!  I definitely had the stronger Battle Company, being some 120 points ahead.  That's a slightly misleading value, as two of my strongest heroes, Sayaad and Eashra both have arm wounds and can't use to bows that their skills are set up to take advantage of.  I was too confident, and my son's tactics once again proved superior.

The scenario is greatly influenced by the random set-up.  Priority pretty much allows the player going second to place a good number of troops either nicely close to vulnerable enemy, or far enough away from tough opponents.  This really helped me (as it did last time we played this scenario) and put the Fiefdoms on the back foot from the start.  My son's focus worked very well, taking control of the objective by the middle game and only being challenged for it in the last turn.

Qayid ended up with yet another point of Might, Sabea now has Lethal Shot, a very nice ability that grants a free point of Might each turn to be used on Shoot, In The Way or Shooting related Strike rolls.

All injured parties survived, but interestingly Shawish rolled Lost in Battle, so our next game will be the Rescue scenario.

All the Fiefdoms troops survived too;  I believe the Knight gained yet another point of Fight, but his fight is so far above any of my troops that this is irrelevant.

I'm keeping my company the same for now, as I want to get some more minis painted up, and I have a few other projects to complete (including, possibly, camps for the two scenarios requiring them).  The Fiefdoms went on a recruitment drive and now have three more members, equalling my ten.  The include another knight, and after a bit more spending of Influence, he is also mounted.

This was a great fun game to play.  I'm looking forward to the Rescue scenario, though I suspect it will be difficult for me, Shawish starting out just outside the Fiefdoms' deployment area.  He'll be relying on his Parry a lot.  

We are taking a mini break as we paint up more minis and I want to work on some more terrain.  We'll be back before long thouhg.

A Fiefdoms Battle Company

Since I posted my Harad Battle Company I thought it only fair to show my son's Fiefdoms Company.

The full company

Blackroot Vale Archer, Knight and Man-at-Arms

Another Man-at-Arms and an Axeman of Lossenarch

Archer and Man-at-Arms

There are fewer of them, as they are generally better troops, and there is a lot more variety in troop type.  Most of the relevant minis are available at the moment, and in metal too (with the exception of the Men-at-arms), as part of GWs rolling program of reissues.  My son decided to use some of the Citadel Guard as the Dol Amroth Men-at-Arms, partly as he already had some, and partly as we have read poor reviews of the official minis.  They are Failcast, and the pikes just don't hold up well in this material ('pool-noodles' is the kindest description I've heard). I think his choice of colours makes it clear that they are not from Minas Tirith. 

I really like the painting on them, despite the different style to my Haradrim, the use of the same basing material (Geek Gaming's Plains of New Zealand with some added tufts) they all look right together.

We weren't sure about how to name them. Presumably they would use similar naming conventions as Minas Tirith?  He'll get round to some names soon, now that the bulk of the painting is done; for now at least.

Note that since taking the photographs one of the Men-at-Arms has died, but more troops have been added, particularly a Clansman.  I'll do a reinforcements post soon combining the various additions we have both made.

Kings of War Battle - 2000 points League of Rhordia vs The Herd

As I mentioned recently, I've been taking advantage of a short break to sort through various draft blog posts. I posted a 1000 point League vs Herd battle here, this is what I presume was the next battle we played, since it's gone up from 1000 to 2000 points, and is set following a Herd victory.

Unfortunately, I didn't write very much at the time, little more than the introduction and the photos. It might still be of interest, so here it is, and you can check Merlin's report for more details. 

Merlin and I continued our vague storyline of the border conflicts between the League of Rhordia and the Herd.

This time, with me hosting, I wanted a bigger battle and I thought the Herd would be capitalising on its previous victory by invading one of the provinces in the League, thus the Invade scenario provided the basis for the game.

League lands about to be invaded by the Herd 

Some of the Herd Horde 

And the rest of them 

And that's all I wrote at the time.

I see from Merlin's blog that this was a League victory, though only just. Despite managing to do lots of damage to the invading Herd, the League only got one extra Victory Point. I do remember that this was a great fun game, and an opportunity to get my horde of mercenary pike on the table.

Sadly this was the last game we played with our League and Herd armies. We had already begun our Ogres and Goblins, mostly because we knew that the new edition of Kings of War didn't have lists for Herd or League of Rhordia in the main rules, and we wanted armies that we could use straight away.

When we finally got the third edition lists neither of us liked the changes. The Herd's Stampede, one of Bodvoc's favourite units, was, I think, removed (there were issues of balance, the Rules Committee felt is was overpowered and needed adjusting. Rather than rushing through changes, it was removed until further testing could produce a more balanced unit.  I understand that most players now use them as Chariots). The League lost a lot of the Halfling units in preparation for splitting off the Halflings into an army of their own. A few loyalist Halflings remain in the League, but not many. It might be fun to revisit these armies at some point. The latest lists in the Red Book have a few changes from the Green Book, so we might like them better.

Kings of War Battle - 1000 points - League of Rhordia vs The Herd

As I'm currently taking a short break I've been looking through my blog and I found I've got quite a few unfinished blog posts stuck in 'drafts'. I'll dump some of them, like a birthday post marking eight years, but I think others have some interesting stuff.

Here is a 1000 point, second edition Kings of War battle between my 15mm League of Rhordia and Merlin's Herd. The reference to an ogres vs goblins battle allows me to date it to August 2019. You can read the report of the aforementioned battle here.

I never finished this report, but I think it's worth posting. I'm sure you can work out pretty much what's happening from the photos.

"After the ogres vs goblins battle, Merlin and I had a larger battle to continue our story of the conflict between the Herd and the League.  Again Merlin had come up with a scenario, this time giving me a chance to find and wipe out the Herd Shaman behind all the recent disruption.

The Shaman of the Peaks.

A  battle of 1,000pts per side between The Herd and The League of Rhordia.

          Loosely based on the Dominate scenario, p85.

Note: The Herd has 1,000pts plus a shaman, the League has just 1,000pts.

Game lasts 6 turns, then throw a d6, on a score of 4+ play one last turn.

Ogli Starberry had won the argument with Duke Errington. The League needed to follow-up their recent battle successes against the Herd and pursue them into their homelands. Recent information led the halfling to believe that the Herd were being compelled to attack League homelands by a sinister Shaman known as Oddroc who dwelt somewhere in the heavily wooded foothills of the Aven Peaks. If they struck quickly the league could seek out the foul shaman and wipe him and his followers out once and for all.

Set-up: place 3 objective markers on the battlefield-these represent the possible location of the shamans dwelling. All 3 markers should be placed on the middle line of the table, at least 12” apart. The Beastman player then notes which of the markers represents the shamans hut whilst the League will have to 'search' the markers to find the correct one-this is done simply by moving into within 3” of a marker, throw a d6, on a 5,6 they have found the shamans hut. The third and final marker will be the hut if it has not yet been found. The shaman will be placed in the doorway looking outwards. 

Players then throw a dice, the highest score chooses table edge and places their first unit.

Players then alternate deploying units until both forces are deployed.

Objective:  At the end of the game, players need to add up the points values of any of their units within 12” of the shamans hut. If the shaman has been killed the League may add his point tally to their total. If the difference in scores is more than 10%, then the player with the highest total wins the battle. 

The League can win the whole war if the slay the Oddroc the Shaman as then the Herd forces will fall apart and start bickering amongst themselves as usual.

My League army consisted of;
Duke Errington, Baron on horse (he has been demoted from Duke to Baron since he always loses the halflings under his command.  They are no longer Inspired by him)
Sgt Alefast, Halfling Master Sergeant with a bow
Ogli Starbrow, Halfling Sorcerer with the Zephyr Crown
1 Regiment of Household Knights with the Aegis of the Elohi
1 Regiment of House Guard
1 Regiment of Halfling Knights
1 Regiment of Halfling Spearlings
1 Regiment of Halfling Archers
1 Troop of Halfling Scouts

(Unfortunately I don't know what Merlin fielded and it's too long ago to find out, but it included some Centaurs and the Stampede)

The field of battle

The Herd preparing to defend Oddroc

More Herd, including Merlin's nice new Stampede on the right (nice if you're not in front of it when it charges, as I later found out)

The League prepare to seek and destroy

The two armies about to clash.

The opening moves; the League are cautiously advancing, trying to guess where the shaman will be.

The centaurs spy the halfling Scouts in the wood and charge in, wiping them out completely

The knights take the bait and charge the Stampede, but can't damage them enough to slow them down, due partly to facing them on the edge of the woods.  Likewise the House Guard are hindered against the centaurs

The Stampede crashes into the flank of the House Guard, leaving nothing but trampled mud and bodies, then they turn.

Sgt Alefast and the halfling knights charge in and the halfling spearlings face the centaurs.

The victorious Herd celebrate.  

Only Duke Errington and the Halfling Archers survived to bring the sorry tale back to the League.  Doubtless they had different versions of events; the Duke told how he bravely rode into enemy territory to try and seek out the shaman, only to be let down by the *ehem* 'short'comings of some of his troops.  The archers complained that the Duke treated his army as disposable and took little care about their deployment or tactics.

Merlin played very well, and used the terrain very much to his advantage.  Hindered charges make a big difference to a League army, and Merlin was able to put me in the position of either having to make a Hindered charge, or face a charging enemy.  Of course, the fact that most of the Herd don't suffer hindered charges only made things worse for me.  Well played.  

(We'll be back)"

Siezing More Ground MESBG Battle Companies

We had another go at the Sieze Ground scenario with the most minis we've had on the table so far. The Fiefdoms had nine troops, and Harad had ten. All of our troops were available, despite the increasing number with Old Battle Wounds. 

By now my Battle Company was nearly one hundred points ahead, which gave the Fiefdoms six rerolls and six extra Influence Dice after the game. I suspect those extra Influence Dice are going to cause me problems next game. 

Set Up

The Fiefdoms set up in a line, spread pretty much along their deployment zone. Look out for that knight out on the flank!

Harad bunched up in a bow contingent and a melee group. We both had an objective within easy reach.

The oncoming Fiefdoms. The Knight is off to the left, and one of the Blackroot Vale Archers off to the right 

Harad grouped according to battlefield role 

Opening Moves

Both forces move forwards while allowing the bulk of the missile troops to fire. We both have one archer who suffers no penalty for Moving and Shooting, so these led the way. Archery was disappointing, with arrows hitting obstacles (by the end of the battle, the hedge was full of arrows) or glancing off armour.

The advance continues. I decided at this point to place Ahad, one of my Bowmen, on the top of the ruined gatehouse, but he failed his Climb roll. Twice!

I also split off a couple of troops (Shawish and Tise) to take the objective on the hill.

The Knight continues his flank move, I was hoping to have everything wrapped up in the centre in time to deal with him. 

Blackroot Vale Archers move up to the hedge and control the objective behind it.

Archery was, again, a complete loss for both sides.

Middle Phase - First Blood 

I cautiously advanced my mounted troops as the Fiefdoms were too far away for a Charge and I didn't want to risk being charged. It's clear that the central objective is going to be the focus of the battle.

The Fiefdoms troops move to hold the gap 

While Khamsa cautiously approaches the gap in the hedge 

Khamsa the Raider charges the Men-at-arms and Qayid charges the Highlander. One of the Men-at-arms peels off to tackle Qayid, but the mighty Harad leader (after taking inspiration from the banner fluttering nearby*)  knocks his opponents to the ground and takes both of them out of the fight. Khamsa is less fortunate, and is pulled to the ground and dispatched by his opponents.

The first combats of the battle prove particularly bloody

The Fiefdoms finally gain priority and Harad troops gain the hill top, avoiding the Knight's attention. He is more interested in charging Arbaea (the Banner Bearer), accompanied by one of the Men-at-arms. Despite this Arbaea fights them off, even managing to drop the Man-at-arms. Other combats are inconclusive (I forgot to declare a Heroic Move, allowing Qayid to be charged.)

Archery finally took its toll, with the Blackroot Vale Archers taking out two of the Harad Bowmen on the other side of the hedge.

Shawish leaves Tise on the hill top, his skills are better used in the melees around the gap. Accurate shooting from a Blackroot Vale Archer takes out Tise on the hill top, denying Harad the objective there.

Various Duels are bloodless, but now that Harad is Broken the Fates decide the engagement is over.  Each side has one troop on an objective.

But the central objective is controlled by the Fiefdoms, giving them the win.

Aftermath

Well, another great fun game, and a well deserved win for the Fiefdoms.  My son was a lot more focused on the objectives and aware of which ones were close enough to be claimed.  Careful positioning of his troops meant that he had the middle objective, much to my surprise.

One of the Fiefdoms troops will be missing the next game, all of mine scraped through, but my current favourite Bowman, Eashra (he's got the extra shot, just like Sayaad) picked up an arm wound (just like Sayaad). Sabea ended up with an Old Battle Wound, that's three now across the company.

Khamsa got promoted to a Hero, so I now have seven heroes out of a total of ten troops.

The Blackroot Vale Archer sergeant can now call a free Heroic Shoot each turn, good enough in its own right, but the Archers have a nice synchronicity with Heroic Shoots.

Given the number of injuries I used Arbaea's pouch of Healing Herbs, so I replaced them. Otherwise I'm not sure what to spend the remaining eight Influence Dice on. I had planned not to add any more troops until I caught up with the painting, which I have now done. (Another post soon showing the most recent painting, though you can see them on the pictures above). I may well buy a horse for Shawish, which will entail painting another mini for that. It's never ending.

*Company Banners in Battle Companies games don't work the same as the Banners in the MESBG, they give a bonus to Courage rather than a reroll to one nearby duel.

However, Arbaea gained an ability that gives him the reroll that Banners normally do, so he is effectively both kinds of banner in one.