Today was the big test for Big bird! This time around, Gwaihir joined the Knights of the Blood Rose to do battle with the Mouth of Sauron and a bunch of Morannon Orcs. In addition to the eagle, I added another knight with a banner (very key to not giving away automatic VP's!) and a whole bunch of shields to my spearmen.
So, this was my force, with the usual 2 stormcallers. No Army of the Dead.
And Rich's Orcs, with some spiders, warg riders, and a Troll:
Here we have our deployment, which was not terribly spectacular. With this scenario, all it takes is the fist unit to roll less than a 4 to force you to support those early drops with additional warbands.
I ended up just behind the central hill. This time, I wanted to use the heavily boosted cavalry unit along with the bird to inflict massive damage, instead of being a harassment unit as it had been previously.
The orcs, with the Mouth of Sauron, moved most of their numbers back, leaving a few behind. His big orc unit on the other side of the board got into position to head towards the central hill. The troll stayed in place to toss a rock (which missed) and the spiders/wargs moved to join the Mouth of Sauron.
I killed off the few orcs left behind, and the lady stormcaller managed to get off her Nature's Wrath spell with a '6' getting back all the will.
This was the crucial turn of the game. I managed to get priority (didn't have it very often this game), and did a key charge with the eagle, hitting the Mouth of Sauron. I didn't want him draining the will of the Stormcallers, so I thought I could neutralize his magic. Plus, killing him would get me 3 VP's! This would be a big challenge for Big Bird!
I was able to get one more Nature's wrath, while the other caster failed. My higher fight skill really made the difference in almost every combat, as the elves managed to survive being outnumbered in most fights. They even got some kills in this round...
You can see how the Wrath spell affected the combats by all the upside down spiders! Two wargs were knocked down, which let me kill the riders (wargs then ran away). So, all of the orc cavalry was wiped out pretty early, giving me a major advantage in movement. The eagle and the elf cavalry all move 12, and that is huge in a close up scrum like this scenario.
The game was beginning to favor the elves once Gwaihir killed the Mouth of Sauron! The right flank of the elves had crushed the orcs, and it was creating a numbers advantage for them. The orcs were nearing their break point, but could this work n their favor? You can see the remaining orc unit moving towards the hill along with the troll. Would they get enough bodies on that hill when the game suddenly ended?
Stay tuned for tomorrow's exciting episode! We find out if the elves can get back to the hill in time to add to their point total and kill more orcs!!!
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