Armies of Arcana Forum

[Rufus]

Just before the war with the gnomes

an account of a decisive battle between the valiant soldiers of Averland and the numberless green menace


Captain Fries' pyrrhic victory over the goblinoid vanguard gave the Avermarshall the time he needed to assemble a full army. Less than three weeks passed before the troops under Colonel Frundsberg arrived at the further end of the Blackfire Pass, ready to deal with the impending invasion once and for all.


The Grand Army of Averland

Colonel Frundsberg
Andreas Karlstadt, an Adept of the Bright College
Johann Eck, an Adept of the Grey College
Captain Theuderic, riding a Pegasus
Captain Theudebert
Twenty-four elite pikemen
Twenty-four Dwarf pikemen
Twenty-one swordsmen
Twenty-one swordsmen
Twenty-one militia swordsmen
Ten Bergjaeger archers
Ten Halfling archers
Ten pistoliers
Ten mercenary horse archers
Dampfpanzer, Conciliator
Dampfpanzer, Terminus Est


The Goblinoid Invaders

Twenty-four Hobgoblin spearmen, commanded by a Hobgoblin chieftain
Twenty-four Hobgoblin warriors, commanded by a Hobgoblin champion
Twenty-four Hobgoblin warriors, commanded by a Hobgoblin champion
Twenty-four Goblin warriors
Twenty-four Goblin warriors
Ten Goblin fanatics
Seventeen Goblin archers
Seventeen Goblin archers
Thirteen Goblin wolfriders
A Goblin spell-mutterer
An unclean spirit of the air
Two bolt-throwing engines


Preliminaries



The army of Averland came upon the greenskins sooner than expected. Under the Colonel’s direction, the Imperial troops moved from column of march into a tight formation, with only the mounted troops moving out onto the wings. The goblinoids had arranged their soldiers in a neat and symmetrical line of battle, protecting their flanks with massed missile-fire.






Hour one



The greenskins sounded their advance in the usual raucous manner, pushing forward boldly from the centre. The Averlanders also advanced, though much more gradually.

The elemental spirit under the control of the Goblin shaman flew high into the air above the battlefield, and was at once intercepted by Captain Theuderic and his noble winged steed. In a series of brief clashes, the captain wounded the evil spirit severely, though could not quite overcome it. Far below, the Goblins sent spear-sized missiles from their crude war-engines towards the brave captain. Thankfully, their accuracy was as poor as their craftsmanship.

Imperial archery killed a negligible number of goblinoids. A return volley devastated the Halfling archers, causing the survivors to flee for their lives.








Hour two



Both armies continued their advance, with the greenskins repositioning their right-flank missile troops to allow them to shoot at more valuable targets. The Imperial Bergjaeger detachment emerged from hiding in the woods to the left of the field. In the skies above, the captain was unable to close with his wounded opponent and the fight continued. The Goblin shaman laid a minor enchantment upon the Hobgoblin spearmen, granting them tongues of flame.








Hour three



The two armies were now extremely close, and it seemed that the wider goblinoid formation might envelope the Imperials. Captain Theuderic at last exorcised the aerial demon, flying through its insubstantial remains to take up a position behind the greenskin lines (and dodging their ineffectual shooting). Both of the Imperial wizards cast spells of protection and strength onto the pikemen, bolstering their resolve for the coming melee. The greenskin general ordered his fanatics to take up a position in front of his own unit.






Hour four



Colonel Frundsberg seized the initiative, ordering a general charge. On the left, the mercenary horse archers, the Conciliator, and Captain Theuderic all charged a regiment of Hobgoblin warriors. In the centre, all three swordsmen units charged - two at regiments of Goblin warriors, the third at the deadly fanatics. On the right, the pistoliers and Terminus Est engaged another unit of Hobgoblins.

To the left, the Hobgoblin champion was grievously wounded by the captain, and a great many warriors were crushed beneath the iron wheels of the Conciliator. Faced with such overwhelming force, they broke and turned to flee.

To the right, Terminus Est also took a heavy toll. The Hobgoblin warriors knew that the fight was hopeless, and their resolve collapsed.

In the centre, the fanatics swung their weapons with deranged glee, scything down no less than fifteen militiamen - but, crying out to Sigmar, the men swore to fight to the death.

The other two battles, fought as they were between combatants of little skill, remained deadlocked.






Hour five



On the left flank, the fleeing Hobgoblins were mown down by Captain Theuderic, the horse archers and the Conciliator. As the captain touched down on his flying mount, he was set upon by wolfriders. Although tired, the captain fought his attackers to a standstill. The horse archers were not so lucky - they took a full volley from the Goblin archers and bolt-thrower, suffering such heavy casualties that they immediately turned to flee.

On the right, Terminus Est and the pistoliers ran down most of their Hobgoblin opponents. But the pistoliers faced the same level of firepower as the horse archers, and were sent running for their lives.

In the centre, the murderous fanatics charged through the remaining militiamen, and engaged the flanks of both swordsmen units at once. Though they caused some damage, the two Imperial wizards quickly lashed them with spells, striking down half and driving the others to collapse from sheer exhaustion. The swordsman unit to the left held its own in the continuing battle, but the one on the right had taken heavy losses both from combat and from evil magic, and turned to run.









However, the greenskin army was badly shaken by its losses so far. Devilish Imperial war-machineries had penetrated their line on both sides, and in front of them they still faced a fresh line of veteran pikemen, commanded by the Colonel and by Captain Theudebert. To the Hobgoblin general, the battle seemed already lost. Shaking his head, he gave the order for the standard to be turned around, and for the retreat to be sounded. The day went to Sigmar, and to Averland!




Photos by Remy!

[Remy]

Thanks Rufus for another great report!

One thing to point out was that the centre unit of militia only held on a morale check of double 1, that Rufus promptly rolled. Apart from that initial 'hit' done by the Goblin Dervishers though, and the usual deadly Goblin archers... nothing really worked in my army, and due to our army compositions, I never really felt I would have much of a chance.

Maybe people can tell me what I did wrong here?

But mainly: I had absolutely no counter whatsoever to a Dwarf Lord on Pegasus. Were he mounted on the even more optimal Giant Eagle, it would be even worse. Evasive flying monsters are awesomely powerful, just as I have shown to Rufus many times with my much-loathed Oriental Dragon. But the combined stats of this guy is even nastier than the 'O' Dragon, he's basically unkillable unless he does something stupid like take on a huge RAF unit by himself (but even then, he can easily flee & escape and rally later if he gets a bad morale roll).

My infantry units, even led by the Fearsome Hobgoblin Heros, simply can't win if they are facing the combination of monster (Rufus's twin Steam Tanks are actually Elder Wyrms) and RAF unit. It outright trumps the combination of Hobgoblin Hero with unit... my Hobgoblin units were utterly devastated by forces costing LESS VP than they did you will note as well. And there wasn't even that much luck in it (although Rufus was above average with all his Wyrm attacks).
The advantage of the monster in combat to CHOOSE whether to attack the Hero or the unit, whilst the Hero HAS to fight back vs the monster was huge.
My Spearmen unit would've held out better, but still the odds were against it.. and it would've been demolished by the enemy Pikemen anyway, so even though I'd only lost 39% of my force and only just failed (rolled an 8) on my Attrition break test of 7, I would've given up anyway probably - given the late hour. I never give up otherwise, if only cos I like to give the opponent the satisfaction of destroying all my guys (Heheh, I have other reasons for this on games like Starcraft as well.. but I'm not going to delve too far into psychological game theory here )

I tried a new tactic with my Goblin Dervishers here - putting them in one big unit and hiding them until I was ready, but they are still way too easy to predict and sucker, and so vunerable for their huge VP cost, that I have come to believe they are near to useless against a clever opponent. You're basically just making life difficult for yourself by having 37 point models with 0 armour and Berserk!

The game was still great fun, don't get me wrong. It was lovely to see a real 'massed battle' effect. You'd never get that in WFB as half the units would've been fleeing all over the place due to bait&flee and panic tests etc.

But the more I play AoA the more power and effect I see the monsters are having (not less, as had been suggested). Yes they are not useful on their own. But they are the single best way to spend your elite points, and I've seen it every time I've played AoA both in my own army and in my opponents. Yes they need to be used well, but every game between me and Rufus has been won by the army who had the clearly the 'better' monster selections (ie: on paper).

I asked the rules Qu's that came up in the main part of the board... The other part of contention was when I split-charged my remaining Dervishers into two enemy units to each side of them (they could remain in 12" coherancy) and ignored the Pikemen units ahead of them. Rufus didn't like this! But as far as I can tell it completely obeys all the rules for skirmishers charging multiple enemy units if they wish to - and also, with Berserk movement you have the OPTION to ignore closer engaged enemy units, but I don't see any reason why you can choose not to ignore them, as I did in this case. Anyway, wasn't a huge issue, just want to confirm no-one thinks this was a dubious move at all? It didn't work anyway as they got mullered by both wizards (although we may have done the spells-into-melee rules slightly wrong, as we were running out of time at that point and I didn't want to pause to check them!) and then wiffed most of their attacks, and then rolled a really bad morale check losing enough wounds to wipe them out.

[Rufus]

Don't worry - having established that the worms are good, I don't feel any need to use them again.

[Remy]

Oh, so I don't need to buy myself some Wyrm models then too?

Pheonix and Oriental Dragon are both viable semi-counters, but both are trumped by the Dwarven Eagle-rider easily. (a Pheonix with lucky regen rolls is not bad though - it may actually be able to hold him up for a while!..).

I'm not worried at all anyway really Other than it seems to be a shame for AoA overall to me.. but I'm not convinced yet, just heavily leaning in my opinions.
As I say.. I find it all interesting anyway right now . One other reason I don't ever give up if I am losing is that I'm still finding it interesting to figure out why I am losing and also trying to make optimal moves in the circumstances. In a multi-mplayer RTS like Starcraft I learnt a lot this way about doing max damage to whoever wants to wipe me out even with pitiful forces... it's a great way to play and more satisfying for all concerned generally (they get to destroy every last man I have and rub in their victory ) . Doesn't quite apply to a tabletop game when clearing up & moving on is a priority of course and there's only 2 players in the game .. but the principle's somewhat the same to me!

You're army though has given me some interesting ideas for the tournament list thread. Trouble is I still want to use darn Dwarves! .. and they don't get cheap infantry that I'd like to use in trying to create the theoretical bentest tournament list possible...

Raptor Lizard mounting my HobGob Hero's would not help that much. Although they could rush out and engage the Elder Wyrms they would still get overun easily. (9 wounds x3... vs 6 wounds x1). Giant Eagle mounting them would be better (7 wounds x 2) and would prevent an overun most likely.

Actually that does bring up another rules question.. mixed base size units caused when characters mounted on different base size's are allowed to "join" and lead units normally. Obviously we've been playing they can in absense of any rules to the contrary I believe.

[Rajmahal]

Remy, if you're having trouble with ground based monsters like wyrms, why not just take some artillary? Provided you take some cheapo infantry to skirmish around the artillary so as to protect them from flying monsters, the artillary should take care of the monsters easily enough. Remember that artillary does reduce fixed armour saves and the multiple wounds really helps against monsters.

In my last game with high elves, I defended against an oriental dragon by having a unit of halberdiers skirmish around my two longbow units. This prevented the oriental dragon from landing as it would have suffered flyover attacks and would have then been in combat with the unit (effectively giving the halberdiers to attempts to attack it in a single turn). In the end, the dragon danced around the unit tyring to get around the halberdiers. Eventually, the dragon charged in ... suffered stand and shoot from one longbow unit, suffered 20 flyover attacks (at -2 to hit due to evasion and flyover penalty) and then suffered around 20 first strike halberd attacks due to long weapon skirmishers. It managed to kill 2 or 3 longbows and then fled with only 1 wound remaining. A couple of horse archers shot it out of the sky in a later turn. Really halberdiers aren't even the best choice for this role ... sunblades would be better due to their magical attacks and higher skill. For most armies, they'd be better served using dual weapon warriors in this role as they are very cheap and will be able to make a lot of flyover attacks. High elves have a tougher time than most using this strategy but can still pull it off easily.

For two games in a row, I've used no big monsters in my high elf army and they've done really well. They've faced an oriental dragon, a hydra, a giant and some other big monster (can't remember now ... I think it flew).

I didn't take any flyers either ... which I do see as something of a handicap. However, I'm starting to realize that using flyers really requires a big investment as a small number of flyers is easy to neutralize. I find small flyers are really only much use to ensure fleeing troops don't rally ... something longbow fire can do just as easily.

_________________
Thanks, Raj Dhillon

[Rajmahal]

As for what you could have done differently, I'll have to take a closer look at it and will let you know. I haven't played with the goblin list so I can't really say I'd be speaking from experience.

One thing to consider is that Rufus' list seems to be an unofficial list? He's taking dwarfs, halflings as well as humans. Seems to be mapped to the 5th edition empire style. You're always going to have a danger in such a list of it allowing players to cherry pick the best combinations. Should the empire list really be able to field dwarf characters for example? I haven't looked at the list in detail, but you might want to consider imposing a rule stating that allows only hero-level dwarf and halfing characters (no wizards) and that all dwarf and halfling units be either considered elite or be more generic .... so only one unit entry for dwarf warriors (no pikes and perhaps make them lighter armoured than the proper dwarfs) and only one unit of halflings. Giving a list too much freedom to pick and choose the best of several lists is always going to be somewhat unbalanced, I think. That's why I chose to reduce the choice allowed to Arcadian players in my trial update list.

_________________
Thanks, Raj Dhillon

[Remy]

What you are really describing though Raj is a "defended gunline" strategy that I also believe does definitely have a chance of working, even vs a monster-heavy force.

However, it faces two huge issues:

1. Its boring as heck for both players
2. It's not actually as cost effective as simply fielding your own monsters in response.

Consider the cost of your two archer units and Halberd unit combined vs. the cost of the O-Dragon. The O-Dragon is having a huge impact on the game and your tactics for a minimal relative investment. Its this that makes them such a good use of VP even more so than their raw combat power (but they are always a threat as they can cause morale checks fairly easily always with Fearsome attacks). The cost of protected warmachines is higher still, and the warmachines are FAR worse firepower for the points than normal missile troops. A single Catapult costs nearly what an Elder Wyrm does, and the Wyrm is far more flexible and also easily protected by a skirmish screen of its own if it really mattered (unlikely, given 1 shot every 2 turns with a Catapult). I really honestly see Warmachines as completely terrible option now. The equivalent points of archers will almost always do more damage to anything, and be harder to beat in melee, harder to destroy, more flexible etc. Warmachines seem ok given the perfect terrain and matchup (& a lucky roller!).. but that's about it.

Goblins do not have any 2-weapon troops or anything with higher than skill:2 or any magical abilities. You can't really consider Dervishers as as well as being useless vs single models, they also have berserk so won't even remain in the place you want them. A Dragon could just land, force them to move after it, then fly over them (laughing). You could possibly consider Wolfriders for this task though I suppose?

Goblin Spearmen are probably my best bet for this "defence" line vs an O-Dragon (or even worse.. a mounted Dwarf Pegasus Lord..).

So even if I get 20 Goblin Spearmen for this roll, the flyover attacks are going to cause only 1.1 wound on the O-Dragon, and even if they can get all 20 into btb after that (unlikely!) it will be a further 2.2 wounds (this is assuming initiative roll is in your favour to do this manoeuvre, and the Dragon player still goes for this move.. not going to be the case often!). That's 280 points worth of Goblin Spearmen. The Dragon itself is only costing 315, and can pretty easily just charge and more than likely break the Spearmen itself if it wants to.. 3 dead, morale check on Ld 6.
And this is all basically talking about the Dragon player NOT using his dragon well, in a worst-case scenario.. and its still doing alright for itself!

A smart O-Dragon player in this situation will not actually make this move but use the threat of the Dragon to force your troops to remain like that, and then use a combination of other things to beat them. As I say.. its not that monsters stack up amazingly well on their own.. its just they are the best combo that can be taken with core list stuff from what I've seen in every game I've played.

Perhaps the Elf list can work better without monsters than the lists we have been playing (mostly Humans and Goblins), since the Elves get high skill troops and special abilities that other lists don't get.

Its also not that "take monsters" is best, its that taking the GOOD monsters is best. Giants, Hydras (depending on how the rules are meant to work!) and stuff you describe are NOT good monsters at all! They are in fact pretty awful ... anything with high melee costs AND high missile costs is generally a bad buy as it cannot use both effectively - again, not saying they are impossible to use them well always... But I just read a great (tongue-in-cheek, but true!) quote today "if you have mad ninja skillz and your opponent doesn't, then anything works"! The O-Dragon is clearly good though and one of the best at certain things. But it will still depend on your opponent to use it smartly.

My point is that: IMO, regular Characters, artillery, (vehicles if you count as elite), and a load of the 'bad' monsters - all pale in comparsion to: Elder Wyrms, VP-efficiently mounted characters (usually Giant Eagle, Pegasus type things), Pheonix, Oriental Dragon - and probably some others I've not spotted.
The only debatable thing for Elite spend for me I think is actually is Wizards. I think one or two Wizards is likely still a great spend of elite VP as they can also combine well with your core choices, depending on what you take and how you use your spell list.

As for Rufus's list, I totally agree in principle with what you are saying. But the counter point is that it's not as bad as you suspect: It was a Baron's list that would all be Thane's rules tournament legal barring the Dwarf Lord and the Dwarf Pike unit. But if the Dwarf Pike unit was just Human Pikes it wouldn't really have made much difference at all.. and a Human Lord on Peg or Eagle is not THAT much worse than a Dwarf one.. although the Dwarf is definitely better I'll give you that. If they could mount a Paladin Lord on Pegasus (probably illegal I know, but who says he can't ditch his horse? ) it would be really close however it would be wasting a lot of VP on his Move stat being thrown out!

The Pistoliers were just Horse Archers really, and the Halflings just standard Archers.. Rufus is just calling them other things based on his fluff/models (which I like )

[Rufus]

Rajmahal wrote:

One thing to consider is that Rufus' list seems to be an unofficial list? He's taking dwarfs, halflings as well as humans.

It's the Barons of Thingy list from the rule book (not one of the unofficial Empire lists, which I will not use ever), though I did use one unit of dwarf pikemen, a dwarf champion on a unicorn (!) and a dwarf lord on a pegasus. The Halflings are actually humans, Pistoliers are horse archers, and so on.

The dwarf pikes and champion didn't get into combat, so we can ignore them (they aren't that different from human pikes anyway - only in magic save and morale, both of which can be upgraded with the addition of a character).

As for the lord on a pegasus - a human lord would have been very similar, and he didn't do a great deal anyway. He's only a dwarf because I have a model of a dwarf riding a pegasus!

So what difference does it make?

[Remy]

Also just to point out I did have 2 Ballistas and they were completely useless. They had next to no effect on the game for 400+ points - I should've taken a monster instead! - well.. that's my point anyway. (or more normal Archers, actually).

The Pegasus rider could've taken the Bolt Throwers with judicious ease at almost any point in the game actually (he only got stuck in combat for a round with the elemental as Rufus handily forgot he could Overrun! ) .. but he didn't even need to bother as they were such a laughably minimal threat to him. They only hit on 1's at normal range (half hits on a 2) and do half hits anyway (skirmished).. and he still has 6 wounds to get through (7 if it was an Eagle).

He could've also easily tied up a greater-VP-than-himself unit of Archers for the whole game at any point as well. But Rufus was smart and used the threat of his ability to do this to even greater advantage.

I hate to say it.. but I commented during the game, that even in WFB a Pegasus rider wouldn't enjoy the risk of dancing around in front of Bolt Throwers!

[Rufus]

Bolt throwers are daft anyway - what the hell are they for? I have no idea why they bothered using them in sieges.

You ought to take a cannon instead. It still won't do anything, but at least it would be a threat. I might have been slightly worried by a cannon.


Also, I can't see what was so weak about your army. Three units of double-wound infantry led by fearsome death-dealers? Millions of archers?

[thanesgames]

Well, the single big thing I would have done differently is broken that wolfrider unit into a skirmish to charge the dwarf on pegasus and horse archer units. That would likely have at least let the hobgoblins get away, and may have well split up the attacks enough to prevent them from breaking. The wolfriders could well have put enough wounds or mass on the pegasus rider to make it test. In general, they were stuck out of the battle because they were behind the center of your line - they could have made a huge difference on a flank where they could have challenged the horse archers.

The Hobgoblin units were both attacked by more points than they were worth, and it really wasn't the wyrms that broke them, it was the ganging up.

I would have run the dervishes on the flanks, to hit an engaged enemy on the flank so they wouldn't take the big morale penalty. They have so much damage potential, they could even be run in smaller units for that purpose. First strike and missiles are their bane though.

Ballista are awesome. Usually - Fate can always kick you in the 'nads. I have no qualms about taking them, especially if the enemy is likely to have cavalry or monsters. I would happily shoot at the dwarf on pegasus, even in combat with the air elemental, because it is the most effective way to neutralize him. You don't have to kill him, you just have to make him weak enough that charging anything is more dangerous for him than what he charges. This shouldn't be that hard, since he is still only likely to cause 3 wounds in a turn of combat. You are still effectively hitting on 2's if you shoot at him with ballista, and d3 wounds is nothing to sniff at. Used in pairs, you even have a fair chance of killing him in a round.

They could have been awesome against the wyrms as well. A big nasty at 3 wounds down has to start really thinking about how badly he wants into another fight. There have been many, many dragons and heros on pegasi/eagles that have spent the game hiding back on their edge of the board because they took a ballista bolt through the chest.

the air elemental might have wanted to stay on the ground near the main force instead of engaging the hero, who was clearly superior. Air elementals are great for tying up enemy monsters, but really bad against skill 4 heros. Saving it to assist in a combat against normal troops, or to tie up an enemy horse archer unit would have been great. If it was low and the pegasus rider charged it, he would be on the ground for shooting purposes (easier to hit with missiles) and in a position to be charged by your units while his units were still on the other side of the board.

I love my goblin army, even though it is missing a lot of the higher quality troops. I've got one unit of hobgoblin spears, and a half unit of two handed weapons.

[Rufus]

thanesgames wrote:

they were stuck out of the battle because they were behind the center of your line - they could have made a huge difference on a flank where they could have challenged the horse archers.

I think he was too scared to do that after the last game, where they got shot and ran off in the first turn!

thanesgames wrote:

The Hobgoblin units were both attacked by more points than they were worth, and it really wasn't the wyrms that broke them, it was the ganging up.

Well, one was. The other wasn't (24 hobgoblins with a character cost 722. The worm plus the archers are 684).

thanesgames wrote:

I would have run the dervishes on the flanks, to hit an engaged enemy on the flank so they wouldn't take the big morale penalty.

They did hit an engaged unit in the flank. Actually, they hit two at once, thanks to a ludicrous charge that left them in line between two units. They only died because some spells were inserted into an uncomfortable place.

thanesgames wrote:

I would happily shoot at the dwarf on pegasus, even in combat with the air elemental, because it is the most effective way to neutralize him.

The dwarf was shot at by both war machines two or three times, to no effect.

thanesgames wrote:

If it was low and the pegasus rider charged it

I wouldn't bother, since it wouldn't be a threat.


I only took the pegasus rider in the first place as an anti-dragon defence! Remy seems to have an irrational fear of it, even though I've only used it twice.

[Rajmahal]

Remy does seem to have an irrational fear of the dwarf pegasus/eagle rider ... I'm really not sure why.

Anyway, with regards to what I was discussing earlier about how I dealt with the oriental dragon with my high elves, I said that my solution to the problem wasn't optimal points wise. I wanted to make sure my high elf longbows fired all game from a stationary position. My opponent tried to prevent this through the use of an oriental dragon. I broke the nearest unit (halberds led by hero) into skirmish and had them surround the longbows. This move meant that charging the longbows would have been suicide for the oriental dragon ... thus allowing the longbows to fire unaccosted at the approaching chaos army. The response was for the oriental dragon to fly around to get behind my longbows .... my response was to just reposition my halberds behind my longbows. Eventually the chaos player got frustrated and threw the dragon at the longbows ... he was suffering too much damage from longbow fire to do otherwise. The halberds easily killed the dragon ... they got 20 flyover attacks and all 20 were in combat (skirmishers surround base 9 so they can all get into combat due to long weapon rule). The dragon was very lucky to be even able to make it's attacks .... which didn't do a whole lot anyway.

Now I was just adapting my strategy to the situation. Ideally, I would have replaced the halberds with a unit of longswords who would have accomplished the same thing at a much lower cost ... unfortunately my 2 longsword units weren't in the right position. Poor positioning on my part ... but in the end it didn't matter as the high elves won. You might argue that the oriental dragon forced me to adapt my strategy and was pushing above his weight ... but in this case he really didn't accomplish anything. I planned to have a stationary firing base of longbows and infantry. My longbows fired all game and had a devastating impact on the chaos army. This damage allowed my infantry and flanking cavalry to rout the chaos infantry. I don't really see what the oriental dragon accomplished.

I think that part of the problem is that Remy thinks certain tactics are boring and therefore not to be used ... such as missile heavy, defensive armies or flying monsters shooting at the enemy from up high. However, these are perfectly valid counters to the monster-heavy armies he's complaining about. I don't think it's fair to judge a game system if you're placing your own restrictions on it.

Secondly, looking at the game a little closer, Remy did screw up by placing his dervishers centrally and placing his wolf riders behind his infantry. Why would anyone place cavalry behind infantry? What's the point of paying for all that movement if you're not going to use it? Dervershes shouldn't be paired up against pike units either ... they are fairly useless when facing first strike and long weapons.

The bolt throwers should have shot at the wyrms ... they could have killed one or at least reduced it to 2 or 3 wounds before getting into combat, making it much easier for your infantry to deal with. I'm sure Remy could have found at least one goblin unit to protect them from the pegasus rider.

Lastly, what's the problem with vehicles? I've not used them in a while but they can dish out more attacks than any single monster could ever hope to do. I've had great success with squadrons of chariots and even the bigger war wagons (using the rulebook vehicle rules). They make great firing platforms as missile troop attacks become natural, they force opposing units to adopt skirmish formation, they can deliver berserker troops into the fray. Damned useful if you ask me. They're only real weakness is not being able to ram flyers (which is sensible) and they tend to be expensive ... but no monster can really match them in pure concentrated, front-loaded damage potential.

_________________
Thanks, Raj Dhillon

[Rufus]

Rajmahal wrote:

Lastly, what's the problem with vehicles?

Personally, I hate chariots and won't use them (not the rules - just the fact that they are chariots). Wagons are ok, but they cost too many points, can't make combined charges (since their impact hits scatter onto friendly units in the same combat), and aren't any good after the first round of combat. The worm has twelve fearsome strength three attacks, which is great. And it's really cheap!

I only used the worms in the first place because knights have no value as shock troops.

Quote:

I think that part of the problem is that Remy thinks certain tactics are boring and therefore not to be used ... such as missile heavy, defensive armies or flying monsters shooting at the enemy from up high. However, these are perfectly valid counters to the monster-heavy armies he's complaining about.

Well, gunlines are boring. Personally, I'd prefer to leave flying things out of the game altogether - it feels wrong somehow to have to worry about fighter planes attacking your medievalish army. I'm more interested in maneuvering ranked units around (I liked the way the two lines engaged in this game - that kind of massed combat is the sort of thing I wanted but rarely got in warhamster).

Anyway, was my army monster heavy? Two worms and a character on a flying horsie?

Quote:

The bolt throwers should have shot at the wyrms

I'm not sure he ever had line of sight. But I certainly wouldn't have fired at the pegasus, since the odds of causing significant damage were so low.

[thanesgames]

"I would happily shoot at the dwarf on pegasus, even in combat with the air elemental, because it is the most effective way to neutralize him.

The dwarf was shot at by both war machines two or three times, to no effect."

Then that would just be incredibly bad luck. He should have been hit 3 or 4 times considering he was in combat with with the air elemental for a while too. It probably would have killed the air elemental, but that was a foregone conclusion anyway.


"thanesgames wrote:
I would have run the dervishes on the flanks, to hit an engaged enemy on the flank so they wouldn't take the big morale penalty.


They did hit an engaged unit in the flank. Actually, they hit two at once, thanks to a ludicrous charge that left them in line between two units. They only died because some spells were inserted into an uncomfortable place. "

The map shows them leading into the front face of a big infantry unit with no support.