Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hey, so I was at my LGS today and played two games of escape from goblin town. I only played the first scenario (good have to get 12 models off the board, evil have to kill 3 dwarves), and I haven't actually bought it yet (Christmas shall pay for that one), but it was quite hard on the good guys, so I thought it'd be nice to have a thread where players could go through how best to win each game.
Not that this forum gets a whole lot of traffic, but I'm hoping the hobbit will change that.

Okay, so in the first game I played (and the one I watched before), it was immediately clear the Goblin King was the big threat. Basically, what the evil player wants to do is slowly grind down the dwarves by tying them up in combat with a couple of goblins at a time (maybe going one-on-one with one combat against a stronger enemy, then three-on-one against a weaker one), while the goblin king tries to steer clear of Thorin's Orcrist and pick the others off one-by-one. The best ones to go for are Ori, Balin and Oin, as they only have one attack and not much in the way of defence.

For the dwarves, winning is less easy- you don't get a whole lot of choice in the way of deployment (you have to start in a line), but try and field the weaker fighters and support dwarves (like Bombur and Oin) on one flank, the decent fighters in the centre, and the best fighters (Thorin, Dwalin, Gloin) down the other.
Move your strong group dead ahead, the decent group on their flank, and the weak group behind them, to create a wall of solid fighters at the front, decent fighters at one side, the board at the other, and the weak fighters in the middle and back, where they are less likely of getting into fights.
Push this wedge forward, and try and get Thorin into the Goblin King as soon as you can, with some good fighters around them to stop goblins intervening. Also, try and push a decent or weak fighter forward to attack the scribe- he probably won't kill it, but while he is in combat, he can't summon reinforcements.
From what I've seen, this wedge of fighters down one side minimises the amount of goblins that can charge in early, enabling you to pick them off piecemeal, while Gandalf can pop up, cast Terrifying Aura to stop anyone mobbing him, and then immobilising the goblin king to make it easier on whoever's trying to kill him.
And remember those weapon rules, and when to use them! When allocating wounds on goblins, try to focus on the axes, because they're more likely of hurting your high defence dwarves, then go for picks, then lastly swords.

Alright, My tactic for this would be strange.. I'd heroic march ori and move dwalin first with ori in base contact with him, gloin and thorin in base contact with ori aswell.

oin would move full distance and if need be march until in rage of the king, because a double shot with 6=auto wound will hurt him a lot, I'd turn any 5's into 6's if need be.. this leaves me with bombur and co. These guy just shuffle on down behind these front three, if the goblin king come into contact with one of your front three charge the other two into him too whilst throwing axing him first and defiantly use the piercing special rule for anyone with axes against the king. the goblins will just slow you down, but with 2 or so biting the dust every turn if 3 are in combat then there shouldn't be such a worry there.

hope this helped

 madman12367 wrote:
Alright, My tactic for this would be strange.. I'd heroic march ori and move dwalin first with ori in base contact with him, gloin and thorin in base contact with ori aswell.

oin would move full distance and if need be march until in rage of the king, because a double shot with 6=auto wound will hurt him a lot, I'd turn any 5's into 6's if need be.. this leaves me with bombur and co. These guy just shuffle on down behind these front three, if the goblin king come into contact with one of your front three charge the other two into him too whilst throwing axing him first and defiantly use the piercing special rule for anyone with axes against the king. the goblins will just slow you down, but with 2 or so biting the dust every turn if 3 are in combat then there shouldn't be such a worry there.

hope this helped

seems like an odd but sound move, but if the goblins played their cards right, they'd do something like mob two of the three (definitely thorin) with a couple of goblins each, then just charge one with the goblin king, and basically cut off that one dwarf from the others by meatshielding a load of goblins.
What would be your way of getting around that?

but the issue is with that is that if you mob thorin, the goblins will have blocked the goblin king to get through on the thin walkways, and if they get to an open space by then most of the gobln should have already died in which you mob the goblin king

 madman12367 wrote:
but the issue is with that is that if you mob thorin, the goblins will have blocked the goblin king to get through on the thin walkways, and if they get to an open space by then most of the gobln should have already died in which you mob the goblin king

the thing is, in this scenario, the dwarves start about 10" away from the walkways, and the goblins start on the walkways, so when they run at each other, 90% of the fighting is on the ground, where the goblins can easily split up and mob the dwarves.

10" you say? this is why you heroic march, 8 inches up and thent he control zones prevents them mobbing, right? if there 10" away, 8" march, 1" control zone, 1" base that works out at 10" so that should work..

 madman12367 wrote:
10" you say? this is why you heroic march, 8 inches up and thent he control zones prevents them mobbing, right? if there 10" away, 8" march, 1" control zone, 1" base that works out at 10" so that should work..

true, but goblins can just walk off the walkways onto the ground, then climb around. Plus, control zones are negated once that model's in combat, so you can charge one goblin in, then charge another two round the fighting pair to hit them from behind, then a fourth goblin in front.

even so, then don't have weak Dwarves around the side, just make it a conga line because then the goblins have to go a further way around to get into combat and even if they get it it's not going to a super weak dwarf.

 madman12367 wrote:
even so, then don't have weak Dwarves around the side, just make it a conga line because then the goblins have to go a further way around to get into combat and even if they get it it's not going to a super weak dwarf.

that's a pretty good idea actually...
though if the goblin king managed to beat one in combat and throw him, it'd be like bowling

Yeah There are ways to win this, it just depends on how you play it