WHFB: 2014 02 01 Battle – Empire & Dwarves vs Orcs & Dark Elves – Part 2

02/02/2014

We took a break at 7pm to get the takeaway curry in (thanks Gav !).

Whilst Gav was out, I manned his bolt throwers and ironically rolled more casualties in that turn than he had in the game. Mind you…

RXB unit hold the Hippygriffs for another round ! Before succumbing…
The Dwarf miners also were a threat.

The Dark Riders and Warlocks are loose in the back behind the Empire line and bearing down on the Dwarves.
Meanwhile the surviving hippygriffs turned round and massacred the Shades. The Dwarf Miners then moved in to chew up the Orc bolt thrower crews.

The Dark Riders take on the White Wolves. This was going to be a defeat for me, but the Dark Riders had nothing else to do other than tie up a big unit of Empire Cavalry for another round and inflict a couple of casualties. Inevitably, they were defeated and ran off the board…

Harboth’s Black Mountain Boys, joined by the Shaman on Wyvern hold the line against the Reiksguard and second unit of Hippygriffs, to be joined with a flank attack by the CoK unit ! The CoK destroyed the hippygriff unit but were left in limbo, so did an abrupt about turn to face the White Wolves.

CoK vs White Wolves.

The White Wolves blink and go the other way.

The Harpies take on the Grudge Thrower, they are eventually driven off but silence the machine for a couple of rounds.

The Empire Wizard causes a calamitous detonation wiping out 17 Hammerers, just as the CoK unit appear before them….

The game finished just before 9pm. We agreed it was a draw. The Empire and Orc armies had wiped each other out, leaving the Dwarves and Dark Elves on the table. Neither of these were in a winning position. A good time was had by all.

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WHFB: Xmashammer 2013 – 3 – Day Two

02/01/2014

Byakhee Roo, couldn’t make the second day so I stepped in the hustle his remaining beastmen toward the stunties.

The beastmen were jumbled up and constrained in a narrow space. This proved rather important as rather than hitting the enemy with all the units all at the same time, they were fed in piecemeal.

In the middle of the field, the two main Orc regiments were engaged in combat with the stunties.

But their flank was crumbling.

Yup, nearly 40 Rangererers in your face !

The dwarves saw off the orc General, and killed all but the Ogre champion who was locked in a challenge…for the next two turns…holding up the entire unit !

Having defeated Harboth’s, the Dwarf general and his Hammererersers surged forward.

We opted to give the Orcs an additional 500 points of troops (Fyrd, Night Goblins and a stone thrower), and 1000 points to the Dwarves as a stand alone Slayer army from the Storm of Chaos book.

The Black Orcs held out though.

Chaos Trolls waded into the Long Drong Pirate Slayers.

The Dwarf Miners having defeated and run down the Gor Ambushers, then got attached by the Centigors who had finally destroyed the Gyrocopter.

The Chaos Hounds attacked the organ gun, whose crew fought them off !

The Giant pinned the pirate slayers with a flank attack, allowing the Minotaurs to steam in once the Chaos Trolls had been defeated.

The Night Goblins released their fanatics into the Dwarf Longbeards with predictable results, before the Ogre champion finally succumbed.

But the Night Goblins were wiped out by the Hammerers.

At the end of the game (c6pm Sunday) the Dwarves had won. The Beastmen had been constrained due to the scenery and couldn’t get in fast enough, but when they did were very effective. This left the Orcs to take the brunt of the attack. The Gyrocopters caused havoc on the flanks and weren’t picked off quickly enough.

Another enjoyable game !

As oveerseen by the feline controller….

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WHFB: Xmashammer 2013 – 2 – The First Day

31/12/2013

Initial set ups:

Evil !

T’other end…

Stunty !

Two units of Dwarf Rangers then deployed – one was 40 strong !

The Savage Orcs and Wolf Riders, facing 40 XB armed Dwarf Rangers charge into combat, but bounce off leaving just the Orc Hero to slow down this flank. This leaves 2 Bolt Throwers and 20 arrer boyz in defence. This flank held much longer than expected despite a gyrocopter swooping in.

Flank moves

The Beastmen’s main units get cobbled up and congested behind the scenery. This has a major effect on the rest of the game.

Beastmen ambush the DWarves, to no avail and are quickly driven off.

The Chaos Ogres adided by the Orc General on Wyvern charge into a Dwarven horde.

Some Gors catch 24 Long Drong’s Slayer Pirtates in the flank, but didn’t last long…

The Gyropcopters on the flank mess things up.

Head to head in the centre of the table.

Crunch !

Ambushers turn up

Trolls vs Trolls Slayers – at long last.

Centigors get stuck in to a Gyrocopter.

The centre of the board veers back and forth !

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WHFB: Xmashammer 2014 – 1 – SNAFU

29/12/2013

The day arrives, our long planned two day Xmashammer extravaganza. 4 players plus myself, each player fielding 5,000 PV armies so people get to bring out lots of toys !

My cleaner had popped round the day before yesterday so everything was spick and span. I’d fixed the toilet even (the builders broke it). I’d set the board up, a mighty 8×4′.

It even passed feline approval from BlackJack.

10.30, a clearly unwell Rich phones up and says he is unwell and cannot attend. Clang, that’s a spanner in the works. Clang, two spanners in the works, because he was going to supply Roo with some figures for the Beastman army.

Anthony arrives, is briefed with the news we’re going to have to make it up on the spot, and he points out he has come with an efficiently packed army and has little leeway for expanding his army. Luckily, I have some stunties and go find them, so at least that wasn’t another spanner in the works.

Gav phones up, and e-mails me his army spreadsheet. Clang, another spanner in the works, the spreadsheet obviously wasn’t saved properly so when he arrives we have to start almost from scratch.

So lots of frenzied re-writes of army lists, and we’re ready to go at 12.00…

As von Moltke commented:

“No plan of operations extends with certainty beyond the first encounter with the enemy’s main strength” (or “no plan survives contact with the enemy,”)

Interestingly, von Moltke was also a wargamer.

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WHFB: Orcs & Goblins vs Dwarves – Players perspective

10/11/2012

Byakhee Gavin:

Outmanoeuvred by Dwarves – oh the embarrassment !

Upsides:

  • Managed to use magic quite effectively and imaginatively for once !
  • Bolt throwers certainly thinned out the Dwarven ranks but did not stop them. need to be better protected though.
  • Re-instating the Orc general on a Wyvern, getting him into combat and doing some damage , and could have been very much more effective if it were not for bad dice rolls.

Downsides:

  • Hamstrung myself with inflexible deployment with wide frontages of units, that then suffered animosity and blocked the key units behind them.
  • Unlucky dice rolls on LD rolls that meant c25% of my army fled off the board before doing anything !
  • Dwarf Miners – not sure what to do against them.

Despite losing still had a great time.

Anthony says:

My plan was to try and get the Dwarf flanking tactic to work – I’ve trialled this previously unsuccesfully (KIY says: against Empire, and Dwarves!). On these previous two occasions I was unlucky with the dice against me. the miners didn’t come on and that lost a lot of points, this time…the plan survived contact with the enemy and got the flank attack mopping up enemy units. The use of the Strollaz rune on the army BSB was a key success, and got the entire army 6 inches forward (at least those meant to move)

Upsides:

  • Stonethrowers, when souped up are reliable, and did their job admirably
  • Quarrellerers held the flank remarkably…
  • the scouts (Longbeard Rangers) got into combat second round.

Downsides:

  • Didn’t have enough anti magic, they literally stomped on me…though to be fair they got lucky with irresistable force 5/7 times ! (KIY: he didn’t get his rune of spell breaking off even)
  • The Black Orc Big Boss (Eeza Ugezod) was nasty surprise with a magic weapon with d6 extra attacks and the same d6 result, boosting his strength. The fact I took no wounds was extremely lucky.
  • Getting out manoeuvred by the Orc Shaman on the flank – a difficult one not a huge problem just annoying. One way round this is to give a dwarf hero pistols as a matter of course.

Overall I enjoyed, and had time with time with friends which is the point really.

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WHFB: Dwarves vs Orcs & Goblins

10/11/2012

Byakhees Anthomy & Gavin came round today for a game of WHFB, Richard had to cry off due to fatigue. I was already booked as host and co-conspirator (but not active player) supporting Gavin and his Orcs & Goblins.

Gav & I buffed his army for about 45 minutes (Gav has not regularly played WHFB since our teenage years so is getting a helping hand from the rest of us). He deployed his army:

Anthony’s Dwarves, deployed and refused a flank:

A big firing line, with 18 Thunderers and two stone throwers which were souped up. Longbeard Rangers (38) were deployed in the woods as Scouts. He also one first go as well, using the Rune of Strollaz which moved his enite army forward 6 inches before the game even started ! I’ve never seen stunties move so fast.

(NB: Due to the size of the unit, the two dwarves out the left hand side of the terrain piece are actually representing where the unit is, as there is no way a solid unit like this can be sat in the terrain piece. This is a common sense rule we use as a bunch of mates to keep the game going and fair)

Before we knew it, the stunties were on top of the Orcs and nearing close combat. the goblin fanatics were released but did not deter the bearded sprinters ! In the first go, the dwarf stonethrowers did a direct hit on the massed ranks of Harboths, and killed 13 of them, causing a panic text, which predictably they failed, and ran off the board. nearly 500 points of Orc gone !!!
They also hit the trolls, with a flaming shot and killed two out of six, again first go.

The Orcs then responded. Mostly by failing animosity tests, squabbling amongst themselves and hurling abuse at each other. This paralysed their left flank entirely.On the upside, the foot of Gork spell was succesful and killed 11 Hammerererererers straight off, which was quite a lot of points ! They were also hexed with itchy feet and reduced to a crawl, which is saying something for a dwarf ! The goblin spearmen charged into the Dwarf Longbeards,lost combat (predictably), and ran away.

The bolt throwers were effective (much more than my supposedly suprerio DE bolt throwers !), and the stone thrower did actually hit.

Second go, the Dwarves charged the fleeing goblin spearmen, and followed into the (stupid) Trolls, which they defeated in combat. This caused a cascade of panic attacks, with 20 Orc archers running off the board !.

The Black Orc Lord on Wyvern charged the Longbeards, did some damage, losing combat resolution by zero (musician broke the balance) and promptly failed LD (a roll of 10), and ran away, fortunately not being run down by the stun ties. However it did end up inches away from the board edge which was to prove fatal in the next round, when it fled again off the board (another ~400 points gone !). Again the Waagh! magic went off with another stomp from Gork causing 8 more casualties to the Hammerererers. Again they were also slowed by their itchy feet !

The Rangers having defeated the trolls, and reformed and went in against the bolt thrower crew (x2) with predictable results. The longbeards followed up into another bolt thrower, crewed by Notlob, who did some damage but was defeated and this caused the Orc general to flee again.

In the middle. The Black Orcs (Uza Ezzagod) charged into the remaining Hammerers, made the challenge (a very close run thing) but held at the end of the day. The archers finally moved foward, too little too late. The wolf riders had been decimated by the Quarrellerers (lead by Josef Bugman) and were fleeing and the Savage Orcs again were too little to late.

Gav called it a day at 7.30pm, with the Dwarves winning, with an aggresive combat army list, set up, and fairly lucky dice.

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WHFB: Dark Elves vs Bretonnians & Lizardmen

05/11/2012

A short notice battle yesterday with Byakhee Jim. So short notice he had to buy the pizzas, and we didn’t know what armies we’d be playing. He brought Bretonnians and Lizardmen, and not a stone thrower in sight, however there were several salamanders and a lot of cavalry…

I deployed first, refusing one flank. My army was sort of an attack army, with the two chariots (COC) and some Cold One Knights (COK) backed up with repeat Bolt Throwers (RBTs).

And a scout order of Mengil Manhide’s (only 10).

Jim’s forces consisted of two wedges of Bretonnian Knights, some Yeomanry, backed with some Pegasus borne knights. Then there was the Toad in the Hole (Slann) with 30 Saurus guard, a Skink shamen with 30 skink guard, two Stegadons and the aforementioned Salamanders.

And a Hero on Terradon, which I took captive, put on a proper base and then did the usual basing regime ! 🙂

Here’s a load of photos (20+) ! Roughly in order for the narrative below…

The Bretonnians got down and prayed, having reacted inline with DE fluff (It’s just a pity they’re awake)and taken the option to go first last time, I decided to let them get on with it this time. I suspect there’s a ward save involved and he didn’t get it this time.

Mengil’s got two Salamanders firing at them and the Terradon and hero sniping at them. So they were cut down to 3. The sneaky Toad in the Hole got off some special Skill “Aligning the heavens”, which gave him the ability that when rolling magic any double was a Irreversible spell. He then proceeded to deploy the Comet of Cassandora right in the middle of my forces. At the same time his cavalry surged across the board towards me.

My response was pretty much the same, throw some Hydras, COK and chariots at him. However, I also had to get my Black Guard and a few other items out of the way of the incoming Comet, which snarled up my charging lines (as I tried to keep lines of sight open for the RBTs). Sure enough the comet landed at the beginning of my magic phase but I escaped with only 9 infantry casualties. The RBTs did precious little against the knights, but I did kill 4 of his knights at least.

The armies clashed, his skinks charging my COC, and the Toad in the Hole’s Saurus unit charged the 5 hapless COK who turned tail and ran as did one of the COC. Hmm, this was the second time the COC have made it into combat, and the result was a surprise for Jim. A nasty one, Byakhee Rich has mutterd that DE chariots are nasty pieces of work, and so it proved, as even though they charged, the chariot won combat (just). I think I’ll be regularly deploying these babies from now on. 🙂

The next couple of turns saw the centre of my army become disorganised due to either fleeing units, units locked in combat, or the hapless infantry being ground down. One Hydra was destroyed by flaming attacks, and we managed to work out (we thought) how Hydras and their Beastmaster handlers work in combat properly for the first time. Disappointingly Felhir Lockhurt failed to do any real damage to the knights, because of the 2+ armour save.

So the cavalry squadrons started rolling up one flank of my army, but by then I’d managed to reverse the COC chariot, and got my second Hydra into combat with the large skink unit that had been held by by the first COC.

And this combination defeated that unit and wiped it out.

By then it was 6pm, end of turn 5 and I knew I’d lost, but I’d severely mauled his forces, so called it a day.

Upsides and Downsides:

Upside:

  • Dark Elf Cold One Chariots are good, armed with RXBs, T5, Save 3+ they’re mean !
  • My army list was full of mobile and dangerous troops which really kept Jim on his toes.
  • I didn’t play to type – my opponents know my army too well, but the recent additions of units has started to pay off I think.

Downside:

  • Five Cold One Knights is too small a unit, I need to pull my finger out and paint another five of them !
  • The army list was not right, and the better part of 300 points of Black Guard did diddly squat, next time they’ll be replaced by either chariots or COKs.
  • I need some more tin can openers. My luck was against me when all 4 bolt throwers missed, but I need something to make up for this in the close combat area, and not just Hydras.

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