Kings of War; Orcs and Undead Clash

I had a quick game of Kings of War with my son recently, my orcs vs his undead. As it was some time since either of us had played, we went for a small 500 point battle (Ambush in the current parlance). The aim was simple,  eradicate the enemy. 

The Undead, revenants, a couple of necromancers, skeleton spears and a troop of wraiths

The Orcs, gore riders, two regiments of ax and a krusher

Opening Moves

One regiment of ax rush straight forward, keen to get to grips with the enemy, the other regiment is slowed somewhat to avoid the wood. On the flank, the gore riders carefully manoeuvre through the village.

The undead advance with the revenants taking the lead while the wraiths approach the village. At the (s)urging of their masters, the revenants and wraiths move further forward.

Orcs and Undead advance

The first orc ax regiment charges the revenants, but fails to break them.  The other ax regiment moves up and the riders continue picking their way through the village.

The skeletal spears take the opportunity to charge the orc flank. Between them, the two undead units cause some casualties, orcish armour (and stubbornness) isn't up to the task and the first unit is destroyed. The wraiths move towards the rear of the riders and both necromancers use their magic to repair some of the damage done to the revenants.

The armies clash

The first melee

From the undead lines

Middle Phase 

With the first unit of ax destroyed,  the second steps up. They charged the spears,  but didn't do much damage. Meanwhile,  the gore riders round the cottage,  sure they saw something green and glowing. 

The revenants take advantage of the exposed flank, and between them,  the undead repeat their earlier performance against the orcs.

The undead start to thin out the orcs, where's that krusher off to?

The krusher advances towards the necromancers, eager to try his ax on them, and the gore riders continue their ride, hoping to cause havoc in the undead rear, but the wraiths are surged into their flank, fortunately causing only slight damage. 

With the orc infantry wiped out, all the action is behind the undead lines

End Phase

The gores turn to face the wraiths and contemptuously disperse them, then turn to face the rest of the undead.  The krusher catches one of the necromancers; despite some nasty wounds, the wizard holds.

Only one orc regiment and the krusher left

The krusher is stuck in melee with the spears, but does little damage.  The gore riders take the opportunity to charge the revenants,  but fail to break them (by one point!).

In response,  the spears skewer the krusher,  but the revenants make little headway against the gore riders. 

And that was it. Fate decreed no more hostilities.

The end of hostilities

Aftermath

At the finish, one regiment of gore riders remained, facing the revenants, the spears and a necromancer. We both felt that had we played another turn, the gores would have finished off the revenants and turned to face the spears.  Whether the skeletons could have prevailed, we weren't sure.

But that's not what happened, and the undead claimed victory. 

Final Thoughts; Luck and Tactics

This was a great fun game,  reminding us both of why we enjoy Kings of War. 

The game seemed to go very much for the undead in the first few turns, but the orcs,  as they often do, began to turn things around.  Just not enough soon enough. 

My luck was mostly OK, but my son was distinctly luckier.

Revenants need a 4+ to hit

Just need to Surge 2 inches

He was also canny enough to face my infantry two on one with flank charges, this pretty much does for a regiment and I was lucky that the first lot of ax survived their first turn of melee. 

I managed to get stuck manoeuvring around terrain, and the flanking manoeuvre, though it seemed like a smart move, was really a waste of time, though I suppose it kept the wraiths busy and eventually did for them. I'd have been better keeping them as either a mobile reserve, or as a first strike unit, as they might have been better able to break individual undead units on first contact.

The krusher was poorly used. Initially I kept him nicely between the infantry units, forgetting that he doesn't have Inspiring. He'd have been better adding his three attacks to the combats, as there were several instances of failing to break the enemy by one or two points.

The necromancers, on the other hand, were played very well, using Surge and Healing to great effect throughout the game.

This gave both of us the impetus to play more games, and also to paint more troops (though I have something a bit different planned for October).

I've certainly got plenty of unpainted Kings of War orcs, and it's about time I rebased my original army to match the newer stuff, plus the odd bit of repairs.

I understand that there's a new edition due in December. The Mantic News page has Alessio Cavatore's blog where he teases some of the changes, I'm excited to see what they've done.