Back to the gaming table for another 600 point test game for the tournament which is just days away now. Yikes!
For this game, we did a scenario we had not tried yet... To The Death. This game is all about breaking and banners. It can be very rough on outnumbered armies, that's for sure.
Hanging onto a banner bearer can also affect what you are trying to do, as you have to balance keeping that guy alive vs having the banner in a good spot to get the most re-rolls out of it. This is the 2nd game with a banner, and with Gwaihir as well.
You can see the army here. The usual stormcaller units, and the expanded cavalry unit. In other circumstances, I would almost rather have 4-5 more cavalry than the eagle, but the story of the army calls for this arrangement. Seregond, the Elven captain, is the general as well.
Here are the Evil forces, led by an unnamed Ringwraith on Fell beast. There is a shaman, and Grishnak leading a unit of standard issue orcs. The other orc unit is elite, with the higher fight skill, etc. Once again, Rich kindly volunteered to create a whole new list that he had never played before to go up against an army that we had been fine tuning for months...
As usual, all it takes is rolling less than a 4 on those first units to make you deploy all your stuff as close to the front as possible. Such a bad idea, as a number of concepts are in the official scenarios. That is why we have been playing these games on a 4 x 4, as the extra 2 feet would almost never see use. As you watch this game transpire, you will notice that we could have played on a 3 x 3 board!
You will also see what happens when you only get priority once in a 10 turn game!
The elves are hiding in the woods and the building, while the orcs deploy right up to the edge of their zone.
I knew that the wraith wanted to to sap will on the stormcallers, so I attempted to hide him. I figured it would be impossible, given the flying mount!
I moved the cavalry and bird backwards, so that they could be used to react against either orc unit on the two sides of that central hill. My preference was to go after the weaker orcs on the wraith's side of the board, to stoke up casualties and outnumber the stronger orcs, hitting them with cavalry later in the game.
The hand of Sauron himself intervenes! This was yet another one of my desperation "non-priority" heroic moves to save myself from being wiped out early...
I charged the Wraith with a Knight, just to keep him from casting and to make him use will. Since I had a banner nearby (and the same fight skill), I hoped I might get lucky! On the other side, the elves leave the building (except for the archers), and Gwaihir charges the orcs on the right...
The stormcaller on the left manages to roll a 6 on Nature's wrath, knocking down a few orcs, and getting his one point of will back!! The combats on the left go reasonably well for me, keeping me from being outnumbered on that side...
I knew on the next turn that if I lost priority, the elite orcs on the right would charge Gwaihir en masse. The shaman had fury going, so they would not need to test. I figured that the big bird would be way too good of a target for hungry orcs to pass up! Waiting for them was Delilah, the other stormcaller who had exited the building the previous turn...
So, would the Fell Beast trample over the Knights of the Blood Rose and kill the noble Seregond? Would Delilah be able to save Gwaihir from the ravaging orc horde? Would I ever be able to get prioity or shoot a bow properly?
Stay tuned for the next exciting episode!!!
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