A Brisk Engagement - For King and Parliament! AAR

On Saturday at Cold Wars 2019 I signed up for two participation games. One was For King & Parliament, a variation of To The Strongest! and put on by fellow SJGA club member Ted. 

The scenario was a recreation of the Battle of Montgomery, 1644. I was one of two Parliamentary commanders, and we faced off against three Royalist commanders.

Both sides would have six turns to score more Victory Medals. The Royalists started with an advantage in numbers, since the Parliamentarians had two units of cavalry off the table, foraging for supplies.

The infantry battle started with the two sides skirmishing with their forlorn hope units.

And the cavalry got right into the fight, with both sides charging as soon as they could.

The Parliamentarian infantry commanders were having trouble getting their orders to their troops, and so the blocks of pikemen and musketeers sat in place as the Royalists marched across the field.

The cavalry engagement quickly turned against me thanks to some truly awful card draws.

All three of my units were routed and chased from the table! This left the Parliamentary forces on the hill completely vulnerable.

My foraging units chose that moment to return to the battlefield, and were likely confused by the lack of anyone - Royalist or Parliamentarian - in the area. I started to send them after the Royalist cavalry.

But by then it was too little, too late. The Parliamentary infantry were flanked and, even after going into a "hedgehog" formation, were routed. With that, the Royalists rewrote history and claimed the field in the name of the King.

Ted was somewhat taken aback by the Parliamentarians' poor performance. We were done in just under two hours of what had been a four hour slot! But as my cavalry was so quickly wiped out, and the infantry couldn't hit the side of a barn from five paces away, the game was over rather quickly.

Even though the other Parliamentarian commander and I had some horrendous luck when it came to the card draws, we still had a great time. Like To The Strongest!, For King & Parliament is a fun, fast playing set of rules that looks good on the table.

As I mentioned in the post about what I bought at Cold Wars, I immediately went and purchased enough to start a small army in 28mm using Warlord Games' plastic and metal models. So while I supposed I've failed my "no new games" challenge, I've picked up another army to paint to completion!

Cold Wars 2019, Dogs of War vs. Dark Elves - Warmaster Revolution AAR

My last game was against Kal and his Dark Elves, who I had faced off against last year with my Ogre Kingdoms army. 

The last mission was Flanking Force. As the defender, I had to select four units and a hero to be a flanking force. Every turn, starting from the second, I would roll to see if the units and hero moved  onto the table from a predetermined short edge. Victory points would decide the winner (tallying the points cost of enemy units that were routed or damaged), and breaking the opposing army would provide a bonus.

My brigades steadily moved up, but were mostly waiting for the reaming units to arrive.

The Dark Elves advanced as well.

Luckily, it didn't take long for my flanking force to arrive!

However, I realized that I had chosen the wrong side to bring them on from, as Kal's most dangerous units - a brigade of dark riders - was all the way on the other side of the table.

I would need to deal with the pesky harpies in the Dark Elf army first, ast hey routed one of my crossbowmen in the fields.

My pike brigade was forced to wait as I made a personal blunder and completely forgot to order issues to my knights, leaving them on the side of the battlefield for another turn. However, my galloper guns were able to do some hefty damage to the oncoming witch elves.

I threw a unit of ogres deep into Kal's center, routing a unit of crossbowmen. In return, however, Kal's cavalry wiped out a two-unit brigade that was hoping to delay them.

In the center, a single stand of crossbowmen waited after being saved from the attacking harpies by a unit of dwarfs. The other unit of dwarfs had charged forward, also aiming to delay the oncoming elven spearmen.

And on the left, my knights finally got into the action, but only after the pikemen had done most of the work and taken horrendous casualties.

The knights congratulated themselves on a hob well done, as they ignored the grumblings of the lone remaining units of pikes.

The dwarfs were unfortunately rebuffed and pushed back, with the ogres and other dwarfs unable to help.

However, the game can to an end when the last mini-brigade of crossbowmen and marauders were charged, flanked, and wiped out, leaving victory to the Dark Elves.

This was a close game, and I may have been able to win if I had continued to refuse my right flank, and hadn't forgotten to bring my knights in sooner!

I had a great time, and really enjoyed all three games. We had more players in this tournament (eleven to last year's six) and we had plenty of convention attendees stopping to inspect our games and miniatures. Hopefully they'll attract more tournament players, as Dave plans to run another event at this years Fall In. I plan to be there!

Cold Wars 2019, Dogs of War vs. Skaven - Warmaster Revolution AAR

My second opponent was Karl and his massive Skaven army. It had 30 units and had a break point of 15, compared to my 20 units, break point 10 force!

The scenario was Breakthrough. As the attacker, Karl had to get as many of his units withing 30cm of the opposite edge of the table (my side) before the end of six turns. As the defender, I would have to prevent this, or break Karl's army.

Since the Skaven can field brigades of more than four units (what's normally allowed in Warmaster), Karl had his army move in massive blocks of furry bodies.

Having played on a similar table against Dave in last year's tournament, I knew I wanted to be in the fields. It'd be difficult to issue orders to the units within, but they'd be defended against enemy attacks. So I aggressively moved my brigades up the table, with my knights moving the furthest.

As my pike brigade slid to the right, and the ratmen approached, my knights struck out. I managed to destroy a doomwheel and do some damage to the Skaven brigade on the right.

However, the Skaven returned the favor and wiped out most of my knights, apart from a single units that I managed to pull back.

I could only watch as the massive Skaven brigades began to split and move to outflank my artillery brigade on the left.

My knights managed to bring vengeance to the Skaven, flanking and destroying the remaining doomwheel and hitting the flank of some clanrats and jezzails.

And in the center, my ogres charged in and sent the skaven reeling. The pushback managed to destroy the Screaming Bell at the same time.

My artillery brigade sat and waited for the Skaven to come, betting that the rest of the army could break the enemy before too much damage could be done.

On the right, Karl sent in his plague monks against my pikemen. With Death Frenzy cast on them, the plague-ridden monks put out a ludicrous amounts of attacks. My pikemen managed to weather the storm, however, and used their weapons to poke holes into the Skaven, wiping them out.

As expected, my artillery brigade was flanked and locked into combat.

But my ogres came through and did enough damage to finally break Karl's army before he could reach the objective zone. My Dogs of War got their first victory.

Painting Update - Mordheim, Warmaster

It's been a while since I've posted a painting update, so here's a look at what I've been doing since the last one. 

Also, this is the first painting update I've done with a lightbox. Please let me know if it improves the images at all!

I painted a Mordhiem warband for a campaign that started earlier this year. I liked the look and theme of the Outlaws of Stirwood Forest. They're a fun bunch of range-focused models that can take a Warrior Priest. His Prayers of Sigmar have been extremely useful so far.

I've also finished my Dogs of War army for Warmaster!

This first brigade consists of four units of Knights - heavy cavalry with good armor that can deal a lot of damage on the charge, but still grind through combat if they're not flanked.

My artillery brigade consists of two Galloper Guns - lighter guns than Empire Cannons with less range but better movement speed - and two units of Dwarf Warriors.

And pikes! This Pikemen brigade is one of the unique features of the Dogs of War list. Pikes are based like cavalry, and count as defended when being charged by cavalry in the first round of combat. However, I found that they were almost always better on the offense. While their armor isnt' great, they can put out an intimidating amount of attacks on the charge.

Since the Dogs of War list forces you to take four units of Crossbowmen, I decided to back them up with combat units. This brigade has two units of Ogres supporting the ranged units.

And this brigade has two units of halberdiers, which can be fielded either as cheaper Swordsmen, or better armored Marauders.

And finally, the commanders and the monster! The old Dogs of War list had a Tuska - i.e., a mammoth/elephant equivalent - but this has been replaced by a Giant in the Revolution list.

The Commanders consists of a General, a Hero on a Griffon, a Paymaster with his Paywagon, and two Wizards.

You'll see the army in action in two more upcoming battle reports, and I plan to use it again at Fall In! this year.

Also, this counts as one of my five armies for my painting goal!

Cold Wars 2019, Dogs of War vs. Tomb Kings - Warmaster Revolution AAR

As I mentioned in the post earlier this week, I attended Cold Wars 2019. Friday was spent at a Warmaster Revolution tournament run by Dave, who also ran last year's tournament at Fall In. 

This time I was bringing a recently finished Dogs of War army. It's a fun collection of pike- and crossbow-wielding humans, dwarfs, and ogres (I didn't have the points to bring a giant, unfortunately). 

The tournament format was pretty simple - three rounds with three different scenarios for players to score points in. 

My first opponent was Matt, who had brought Tomb Kings. We played on an appropriately themed table.

The mission was Take and Hold. Each player had an objective in their deployment zone, and another objective near the middle of the table. At the end of the game, a player scored points from the objective if they were in control of it. The further away the objective was from the deployment zone, the more points it was worth. Players could also score additional points by breaking the opposing army.

Both sides spent the first turn moving up the table. Unfortunately, both my artillery and knight brigades refused to move, leaving my pike brigade stuck.

On the right, my crossbowmen and their supporting marauders and ogres moved up, looking to claim the distant objective in Matt's deployment zone.

My knights refused to budge, leaving a fifth of my army useless on the backfield.

My artillery brigade wasn't looking good, with a single unit of skeletons blocking my galloper guns and Matt's bone-throwers and skull chukkas confusing and damaging the accompanying dwarfs.

Finally, my knights got the hint and charged in, with the pikes coming in behind to hopefully provide backup. My cavalry managed to hit and rout one of Matt's two artillery brigades, but couldn't charge through to the next. And this was after I ended up losing a unit and a base to their artillery's fire previously.

Things weren't going great on the other flank, with my brigades being bogged down and having more skeletons summoned in behind them.

The same was happening to my knights - while they were able to trample the skeletal defenders, more units kept popping up and kept them in place.

Worse yet, Matt finally brought his chariots into the flank of my artillery brigade. Even the stout dwarfs weren't going to last long!

My ogres apparently decided to sit on their thumbs and watch as their compatriots were cut down between the two oases.

Even with my hero on a griffin "helping" (turns out skeletons don't care how scary your monstrous mount is), the last of the knights were slowly being surrounded and ground down.

Finally, however, my ogres charged in and wiped out the tomb king forces in the area, saving the last two stands in what had been a four unit brigade!

However, before I could send the ogres towards the far objective, the last unit of knights were routed and my army broke. I didn't manage to claim any objective before the game ended, so Matt claimed a complete victory.