Hey all, it's been a little quiet on the blog front for a while as James and I have been working on our Seven Stones army (more to come on that next month!)
So I thought I'd do a write up for an event that I went to last weekend.
The Tournament
The Eastern Expansion was a 650pt tournament (GBHL 90pt) where players could bring Good and Evil armies. They and their opponent roll and the highest roll would be Good for the round, if a player only had one army, their opponent could choose which of their own to use. I decided at the beginning of the day that I would always do GvE to stick with the theme.
My Armies
The reason for choosing my lists this time was simply that I hadn't used either in a long time, and it gave me a chance to use the Spider Queen for the first time*.
*See how that goes later
Scenario 1: Capture and Control Vs. Sol (Isengard)
Opponent's Heroes: Lurtz, Mauhur and Uruk Shaman
Opponent's warriors: Isengard Troll, Uruk warriors and Uruk Scouts
My first game was against Sol and his Lurtz led Uruks. I deployed stepped slightly back from the centre to use a building so that my flank was protected, counting on the dwarven defence to help me win the coming fight. Dain was in the centre, so that his fearless bubble would cover the army and he could get stuck in. Then as the Uruks get pushed back, I could reclaim the middle, while my Goat Riders claim the outer objectives.
The game began and I held my lines before opening fire at the Uruks, killing a few. The next turn they charged and engaged, as did Dain. He called a Heroic Combat to threaten Lurtz, who called a Strike, so Dain instead rushed into the pikeman and slew him too. Meanwhile, Goat Riders captured the right and rear objectives.
The following turn, Dain and a goat rider charged Lurtz and he was quickly dispatched after an unfortunate Strike off that Dain had successfully mimicked with Master of Battle. Mauhur took on the Iron Hills Captain and was wounded after spending might to draw the combat and losing the roll off. The turn after, he was slain by his foe.
Dain then rushed the Troll that had waded in to kill some dwarves, Dain called the Heroic Strike and got to F10, won the fight and then, to both our surprise, rolled 4 6s to wound!
With the three big threats dead, the dwarves were able to push the Uruks back and claim the objective in their half. A lone Uruk somehow held off 6 dwarves to neutralise the centre and the dwarves failed to seize the left one from the Shaman's warband, but stopped them claiming it themselves.
By the end of the game, I had tagged 3 objectives, slain their leader and broken them to claim the 8-0 win.
Scenario 2: Storm the Camp Vs. Oliver (Mordor)
Opponent's Heroes: Witch King, Troll Chieftain and Gorbag
Opponent's warriors: Black Numenorians, Morannon orcs, Mordor Orcs, Warg Riders and Orc Trackers
For this game, I could see that my opponent didn't have much shooting and I didn't have a lot of pace so decided that I wouldn't try to get their camp.
I moved out of my own leaving 4 crossbows to hold it against any opponents that slipped past. The rest of my army anchored themselves between two gaps across 3 ruins and opened fire. I got lucky in that I killed an orc each time and while I missed the Witch King, I managed to take a fate and might off of the Troll, before taking a wound the following turn.
Oliver sent a small unit towards my left line of Black Numenorians and Morannons. My Captain tried to break through them quickly, but the evil warriors held firm and were a stubborn foe. Dain,meanwhile, charged out and attacked the Witch King. He caused a single wound, but that wound went through all the Witch King's might and fate! The following turn, he was finished by the Lord of the Iron Hills, who went on to fight the Troll in the next. Incredibly, after the Strike went off and he won the fight, he rolled two dice against the Troll (there were two Black Numenorians also in the fight that he wanted to kill) and rolled double 6. In two games, he had rolled 6/6 6s to wound against Trolls!
Gorbag was making himself a nuisance however, and was steadily killing several dwarves, but thankfully for me, not breaking through. By the end of the game, a lone warg had got into my camp, but was outnumbered by my crossbows.
I had broken the Mordor hordes and slain the leader to win 6-0.
Scenario 3: Clash by Moonlight Vs. David (Minas Tirith)
Opponent's Heroes: Boromir, Faramir and Siege Veteran
Opponent's warriors: Minas Tirith warriors, Minas Tirith Knights, Rangers of Gondor, Fountain Court Guards and Avenger Bolt Thrower
In this game, David only had a Good army, so as I said earlier, I had vowed to stick to the GvE intention. Although I was tempted by the higher dwarven defence against the dangerous shooting and Boromir.
I approached as carefully as I could using the terrain (indicated in the pic below), using Heroic March to cover the dangerous gaps in shoot range quickly. It worked really well, as I only lost 3 orcs on the hike...until I was forced to step into the open to charge the Gondorians.
As soon as I stepped out, the Bolt Thrower went into overdrive, and I lost 6-8 orcs in the first volley, followed by the Spider Queen the following turn! She hadn't even reached combat! Razgush leapt in to lead from the front and laid into a small group of men, killing several over the game. The bats flew in and killed a handful too, including in the final turn, where one killed a Fountain Court Guard in Razgush's Heroic Combat as he attempted to get one last attempt on Faramir, before killing another in the next! Razgush made his attempt but fluffed his dice, narrowly avoiding the wound from the lead ranger.
David would have claimed more heroes slain than I, had it not been for my valorous orc archers, who shot through the battle and took out the Bolt Thrower's Siege Veteran! Because of this, when time was called, we had each slain a hero, but both had at least one left. While David had also broken me and had Boromir's banner left to beat me 7-1.
Scenario 4: Destroy the Supplies Vs. Chris (Rangers of Mirkwood LL)
Opponent's Heroes: Legolas, Tauriel and Mirkwood Ranger Captain
Opponent's warriors: Mirkwood Rangers and Wood Elf Sentinels
The final game saw Razgush facing some elves, making him delightfully mad! I knew there was little chance of them coming at me, so I was going to play very aggressively and March over asap.
Over the three turns of running at the elves, I lost ~1/3 of my orcs and the Spider Queen was again slain after being weakened by two Heroic Accuracies from Tauriel and a direct hit by Legolas! But then the orcs crashed over them like waves on a rock. Both sides were taking heavy casualties and the bats had been flown away by the sentinels songs.
Eventually, Razgush joined the fray, having hidden at the back from the opposing shots, and he announced his arrival with the appropriate 'razzle dazzle', beginning by killing a sentinel. He then pounced on Tauriel as her might ran out, and quickly Heroic Struck to win and landed 11 wounds on her, while trapped! As his orcs trashed a supply, he then managed to Heroic Combat off 2 rangers into 2 more before being pushed back by 3 more and then killing all 3 at once in the final turn!
On the other side of the board as I broke, a batswarm fled, allowing a ranger and his wounded captain to destroy two supplies. The bats then passed two courage tests to stay and sit on the last and protect it, killing both the captain and his ranger in the final turn!
Legolas during all this, was hovering near the central supply and doing direct shots at my 1w, 1f shaman, desperate to clear my Fury that prevented my troops fleeing. But over 5 turns, he failed every shot either to hit or to wound! Mostly since the Shaman was fighting a ranger each time and killed a couple. Then, as Razgush slew the last 3 rangers alongside him, a Mirkwood spider smashed his supply and a giant spider paired with a Mirkwood one both pounced. They won the fight against the elven prince as he rolled a 3 high and he was mauled to death!
In that incredibly lucky turn of events, I had levelled the supplies with 2 destroyed each, we were both broken and I had just killed his leader from full fitness in the last combat to win 7-5!
I had managed to get through the day with 3 wins and a loss, having a VPD of +10 and scoring 22. I'm happy to say that this meant, amongst the crowd of 42, I had claimed 6th. I was ecstatic with that being a very middle-of-the-pack player generally, but am very aware of the luck I got in some of those moments.
I will do another tournament report in the future, hopefully not too far off. I do intend to do one for Seven Stones in a month's time. James and I shall also be doing hobby posts regarding our halves of the army prep for it, as we have something really cool planned.
Long live the King!
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