Ogre Kingdoms vs Lizardmen (750 points); 26Nov13

The second game of our ongoing escalation campaign at the 750 point level is against Joe’s Lizardmen force.  My army is as per this post, but for convenience, here it is again.

Miss Madras, Firebelly (FB)

Heidi’s lasses, 6 Ironguts, musician, standard bearer (IG)

Helena’s lasses, 6 Ogre Bulls Cows, ironfists, standard bearer (OC)

Helga’s lasses, 3 Leadbelchers (LB)

Blackcat Bone, Sabretusk (ST)

Joe has evidently decided that non-Skirmisher Skinks are just no good and duly dropped them.  So I’m facing a couple of different flavours of Skink, some flying Skinks and increasingly scary looking unit of Saurus Warriors.  The Skink Chief has apparently grown up into a Saurus Scar Veteran too.

Saurus Scar Veteran, Egg of Quango, Enchanted Shield, light armour (SV)

Skink Priest, Lore of Heavens (P)

13 and 12 Skink Skirmishers (S1 and S2 respectively)

17 Saurus Warriors, full command (SW)

3 Terradon Riders (T)

5 Chameleon Skinks (C)

We’re still defaulting to Battle Line and the random terrain gives us a forest in the North East, a Wyrding Well in the North West and a river in the South West.  The Firebelly rolls something useless again and takes Fireball; I don’t actually think there’s anything I’d have kept against this force.  Maybe Fulminating Flame Cage, maybe not even that.  The Skink Priest rolls Curse of the Midnight Wind and keeps it.  The Lizardmen win the roll off and opt to go first.

The Terradons roll right up to the Sabretusk, and the Chameleons evidently trust their mounted brethren to kill it off as they present their flank.  For reasons which are not clear to me, the Skinks swap sides with each other.  The Priest summons 3,1 magic dice and puts Curse on the Leadbelcher.  The Chameleons manage to outright kill one Leadbelcher but luck smiles on me as they don’t panic.  The Terradon riders are much less effective and fail to even wound the Sabretusk.

The Sabretusk charges the Chameleons in the flank; they’re too busy glaring at the Terradon riders to flee.  The Firebelly leaves the Leadbelchers, at least in part because they’re apparently magnets for ranged attacks, and faces the Terradons.  The winds of magic give us 3,1 magic dice again and they all go into a medium fireball at the Terradon riders.  One of them actually survives the barrage but only for long enough to remember he’d left the gas on back at the temple and flee off the board.  With Curse of the Midnight wind on them, the Leadbelchers predictably fail to do anything to the Saurus Warriors.  Just as predictably, the Sabretusk eats a couple of Chameleon Skinks and runs the rest down.

The Saurus Warriors fail a long charge into the Cows and the Skink Priest bails out of his unit to join the other one.  I suppose that this was to get in a better position for range on his spells, but it looked to me like getting in a better position to be eaten by Ogresses.  He uses his 3,1 magic dice to put Curse on the Ironguts then a hail of poison from the Skinks kills off the Sabretusk and wounds a Leadbelcher.

With the two ‘new’ units both gone and the rest of his force in range of mine, I’m feeling pretty good about this game now.  The Cows charge the Skinks, expecting them to flee and to hopefully redirect into the Saurus but instead they have to suck up a stand and shoot reaction which drops one of them.  Then I declare that the Ironguts will charge the Saurus, foolishly uttering the immortal words ‘Only snake-eyes will fail this charge’.  Naturally, they roll 1,1 and all of a sudden my great plans are for nothing.  Oh well, it would be a pretty dull game if I could predict everything flawlessly.  The Winds of Magic come up with 3,2 power dice and I go for a big Fireball on the unengaged Skinks but fail to make the cast.  The Leadbelchers do shoot 4 of them down though.  The Cows trample the Skink Priest and most of his unit; 3 of them live long enough to flee and the Cows reform to face the Saurus to make them choose between the fronts of two fairly competent fighting units.

The Saurus choose the Ironguts (it’s what I’d have done too) and make it of course.  Sadly, the forest turns out to be a Venom Thicket and a few of them don’t make it to the other side.  The fleeing Skinks rally, and the other ones move across the river and throw poisonous sticks at the Firebelly for a couple of wounds.  In the combat I’m expecting a tough time.  The Scar Veteran uses his Egg of Quango for a couple of wounds but then the Saurus put out a terrible round of rolls and only drop a single Irongut even with the hero and his magic item.  To really rub it in, my dice are on fire and the 15 attacks and 3 stomps back kill an outrageous 14 of the Saurus Warriors.  Needless to say, the Scar Veteran and his few remaining friends flee.  I think that Joe’s luck has continued when he rolls only a 4″ flee but the Ironguts only ponder after them 3″.

That’s pretty much it for the game, but Joe is keen to play on.  Just for a laugh, I decide to try to get the Ironguts into the Skinks so the Cows declare a charge on the Saurus (who flee off the board) to get them out of the way before rolling too low for the distance to reach the Skinks anyway.  Still, it can be a neat trick sometimes since the receiving unit must flee as the charge reaction whereas the charges themselves can be resolved in the order I choose.  With 2,1 magic dice, the Firebelly cooks a few Skink with a Fireball then breathes fire killing all but one.  The Leadbelchers finish off the other unit.  Victory to the Ogre Kingdoms!  Actually, we did play a bit of a further turn in which the lone Skink charged the Firebelly (we allowed him to turn then charge).  All it resulted in was one more squashed Skink.

Another satisfying game with a fun player across the ‘table’ (i.e. floor) from me.  I think I had things in hand anyway even without the Ironguts (which I expected to lose the Saurus Warriors) but the dice stopped any chance that Joe had of pulling this back.  Looking at the other side of the board, Joe needs to learn when to flee rather than holding all the time (in fairness, I also could do with learning this, but it matters less with brutish Ogresses than with squishy Skinks) and perhaps also to stop offering me perfect charges with the Sabretusk.

Warhammer Quiz Results

There seems to be a very minor spate of people on blogs I like posting up the results they got from a Warhammer quiz that can be found online.  Never one to be first into anything, I decided to follow the lead of Flames of the Phoenix and Iggykoopa30 (here and here respectively) and put up my results.

1. Ogre Kingdoms 95%
2. Dogs of War 85%
3. Beasts of Chaos 70%
4. Chaos Dwarfs 55%
5. Orcs and Goblins 55%
6. Hordes of Chaos 55%
7. Dwarfs 50%
8. Skaven 50%
9. Vampire Counts 50%
10. The Empire 45%
11. Wood Elves 40%
12. Tomb Kings 35%
13. High Elves 35%
14. Bretonnia 30%
15. Lizardmen 25%
16. Dark Elves 20%

Perhaps not completely to anyone’s surprise we have Ogre Kingdoms and Beastmen at the top.  Dogs of War are interesting in that they’ve never actually been part of the game when I have been playing it but a quick check online suggests that they’re the mercenary army.  Considering Warhammer Fantasy Battle’s general poor internal balance I can see why mercenaries are probably not a good idea.  The previous (6th edition?) Ogre Kingdoms book had quite a few units which could be in a Dogs of War force so perhaps liking Ogres has bumped them up.  In general, the quiz seems to think I like to play the baddies which I suppose isn’t too far from the truth.  It is interesting that Lizardmen are so low down as I quite like them.  I got one game played using the 7th edition army book and crushed Furycat so completely that I decided that it wouldn’t be a good idea to carry on.  If I was in the market for a new force then they’d certainly be contenders (except that Joe plays them anyway now).  Finally, I’m not sure why Dark Elves should be right at the bottom as I don’t have any special dislike for them.  I did answer ‘no’ to the question ‘Are you an emo’ so maybe that knocks off a lot of points.

Who could ever get tired of a fire-breathing curry eating magical giant lady?

Ogre Kingdoms vs Empire (750 points); 24Nov13

It only took us about 4 months get through the first round of our escalation campaign!  Not a bad effort for us to play only 6 games each.  Anyway, it’s not like we’ve been playing only this one game system, or indeed that we’re in any hurry.  As with the 500 point level the opening game is me vs Furycat; a match up that saw my only defeat in the opening round.  My army is as per this post, but for convenience, here it is again.

Miss Madras, Firebelly (FB)

Heidi’s lasses, 6 Ironguts, musician, standard bearer (IG)

Helena’s lasses, 6 Ogre Bulls Cows, standard bearer (OC)

Helga’s lasses, 3 Leadbelchers (LB)

Blackcat Bone, Sabretusk (ST)

Furycat had added a Witch Hunter and retinue of Free Company militia as well as bulking out his other units.  It is probably worth noting that Furycat has long been a proponent of how bad Free Company are, but put them in for story reasons.

Warrior Priest, Opal Amulet, Great Weapon, heavy armour (WP)

Witch Hunter, Potion of Foolhardiness, brace of pistols

25 Spearmen, champion, standard bearer (S)

2 x 5 Archers (A1 and A2)

24 Halberdiers, full command (H)

20 Free Company (FC)

5 Pistoliers, musician (P)

We’re still using Battle Line until the next escalation.  Our reduced strategy gives us a Scree Slope in the South West, a building in the North West, a forest (which turned out to be a Venom Thicket) in the North East and finally a river (a Raging Torrent when we actually entered it).  I still fail to roll any of the Lore of Fire spells I like and hence end up with Fireball as usual.  Luckily Fireball is pretty good when all units are tiny.  Furycat wins the roll off and opts to go first.

The Pistoliers saunter round the hill to be in maximum irritation position for the Ironguts.  The Archers find out that the forest is a Venom Thicket and the Halberdiers decide that they don’t fancy spending a couple of turns trudging through it being bitten by nasty little things so reform to head around it.  Both sets of Archers fire at the Leadbelchers, and, despite needing 6s to hit and 5s to wound, manage to put 4 wounds on them out of 10 shots.  Luckily for me the Leadbelchers don’t panic.  After that, the paltry single wound that the Pistoliers manage to put on the Ironguts seems a bit weak.

It may have become clear to anyone who has read this blog for a long time that I find Pistoliers very annoying so the Firebelly leaves the Leadbelchers and starts incanting at the riders.  We roll 2,2 magic dice and mid-sized fireball is sent to wipe out the Pistoliers which makes me happy indeed.  The Leadbelchers plink off a single militia man.

The Free Company and Spearmen both charge the Cows, making it but losing a handful of guys to the Venom Thicket.  For some reason, the left hand Archers charge the Leadbelchers.  Sadly, they roll terribly in the Raging Torrent, panic and flee again; presumably leaving the Leadbelchers looking rather bemused.  The Warrior Priest summons up 3,2 magic dice; Shield of Faith is dispelled but Hammer of Sigmar does go off.  The Archers who aren’t running like children fail to match their amazing volley of last turn, then we’re onto combat.  Bizarrely, everyone in the massive central scrum roll hopelessly but the end result is a narrow Ogress win which sees the Spearmen sent packing.  To rub it in, the other Archers also panic at this point; the Cows reform to maximise contact with the Free Company.

The Ironguts chase the Spearmen and Archers away making scary faces as they do so.  I roll a mighty 3,2 magic dice and put them all into the biggest Fireball at the Halberdiers which kills off a good chunk of them; the Leadbelchers kill off a couple more.  Those fleeing Archers are right in the way of the Warrior Priest’s unit and I’m quite happy for them to stay there.  The combat between Cows and Free Company continues to grind away at both units though the Free Company are taking most of the punishment.

The Spearmen and right hand Archers rally, meaning that the Halberdiers are spending another turn just looking at the stupid peasants dithering in front of them.  Furycat rolls up 3,1 magic dice and gets Shield of Faith through (failed dispel) but I am able to stop Hammer of Sigmar.  The Free Company have finally had enough and break; irritatingly for Furycat a single militiaman also survives the run through the Venom Thicket, meaning that the Witch Hunter won’t be likely to rally.  The Cows restrain themselves and face the Halberdiers.

It’s probably worth noting that there’s no good reason to throw the Cows at the Halberdiers here.  I’ve got ranged attacks and would be better to stand off and soften them up a bit more.  On the other hand, that’s pretty boring for both of us, so in they go.  The Firebelly rolls up 1,1 magic dice and kills off a few of the fleeing Archers on the left with a small Fireball.  The main event is the combat though; the contact is quite small due to the presence of the Archers, and if there’s something that Ogres are good at it’s concentrating force into a narrow area.  The Cows win by the closest of margins but Furycat rolls high on his break check and the humans flee and are run down.  With only the Spears left against practically my entire army, Furycat has seen enough.  Victory to the Ogre Kingdoms!

It was quite a strange game with the dice going hot and cold all over the place.  The Archers blocking off the Halberdiers meant that I could have focused all my attention on the rest of his force even if the Spearmen hadn’t rolled terribly and fled in the first combat round.  I didn’t do anything too clever and still got a heavy victory, though in fairness Furycat has knowingly selected some fairly weak units.  It’s always fun to play against Furycat whatever the game system.

Ogre Kingdoms force for slow grow campaign (750 points)

Miss Madras patted her increasing gut and wiped away the last bit of Dwarf vindaloo from her lips.  Perhaps mercenary work wasn’t so bad after all, and while the Little Death tribe certainly wasn’t in a position to be raiding any major food sources any time soon, there seemed to be a never ending stream of other warbands in the area in the aftermath of the battle.  Providing you weren’t too fussy about what you ate (never a problem among Ogresses, especially with curry sauce in the mix) you could easily keep a full belly here.  After a humiliation at the hands of the Humans with their fancy mustaches that had scattered the tribe almost for good, every day had led to an encounter with another race looking to take their turn in the cooking pot.  The constant wandering had allowed some more stragglers to be picked up, including Helena and her lasses who had found themselves a very suitable bit of work guarding a brewery.  They had be quite reticent on what form the payment had taken.

The only troubles were the continued absence of the other tribal leaders and the frustrating lack of progress toward finding ‘El Habañero’.  Still, there were surely clues out there and there was evidence of reinforcements arriving from all corners of the Old World to join the growing armies.  Well, almost all.  The Vampire Barry Von Carstein had been raising his new recruits from the plentiful supply of corpses littering the battlefields, and the Goblins appeared to be learning how to fight rather than increasing in number.  That was probably just as well considering how many of the blighters there already were, mused Miss Madras as she flossed her teeth with a beard-hair.

The first games of our escalation campaign at 500 points have gone better than I could possibly have imagined.  After the stern beating I received at Furycat’s hands in game 1 I was expecting to be on the wrong end of a lot of crushing defeats.  But my dice have been very good to me, and panic checks don’t seem to have caused as big a problem as I expected; all leadership checks are a bit worrying when your general is only Leadership 7.

After arguing strongly before we started this to allow monstrous cavalry at 750 points (which would allow me to field Mournfang Cavalry) I eventually decided that they would just be too awkward for most forces to take down at this level and I would probably win big most of the time and occasionally lose big when someone had a good answer for them.  Instead I bumped up the Ironguts to the full 6 I own and made one a standard bearer (because the standard bearer is the 6th Irongut in my collection) and added 6 Ogre Bulls Cows.  The Cows also got a standard bearer since I have one but I don’t have the points to make one a musician (which I also have as a miniature) so the musician has to stand shamefacedly at the back pretending not to have a trumpet.  It’s a shame my photography isn’t up to the performance of my dice rolling.

My force, the Little Death tribe at 750 points:

Miss Madras, Firebelly

Heidi’s lasses, 6 Ironguts, musician, standard bearer

Helena’s lasses, 6 Ogre Cows, ironfists, standard bearer

Helga’s lasses, 3 Leadbelchers

Blackcat Bone, Sabretusk