Continuing on...
Turn 1
Good won priority for the first turn and advanced cautiously, drawing their bows. The drake took some shelter behind a rocky outcrop against the inevitable hail of arrows, as did the wargs. The goblins scurried under the shadow of the lumbering troll toward the hill.
On a signal the rangers loosed and sent a hail of arrows into the drake, wounding it twice with some expenditure of Might.
Turn 2
Evil won priority this time, and pressed forward aggressively. A warg rushed out from behind a crag and attacked a ranger, while some others ran off along the edge of the ridge. The Troll crested the ridge and looked down on the advancing ranger infantry as a horde of goblins scrambled up onto the hill behind him. The drake rushed brazenly forward, halting just in front of the treeline where the rangers were waiting. The Rangers drew off a bit from the drake and otherwise advanced on the hill, with one mounted ranger charging in to support his fellow against the warg.
Another hail of arrows took two more wounds off the drake, with even more Might spent, and the Warg was defeated and dispatched.
Turn 3
Priority was really important this turn, and Evil won it. Since my opponent was new, I asked him if he wanted to declare any heroic moves, because I knew that letting my drake charge would be bad news for him, but he declined. The Goblins continued to climb the hill while the two wargs lurking behind the crest rushed out and harried the mounted rangers on the far side. The troll chuckled as he ran clumsily into the rangers at the foot of the hill. But most importantly, the drake bellowed and charged the horsemen in the forest, enraged by their stinging arrows. My opponent decided to throw everything at the drake in melee, even dropping a ranger down from the crag on it's far side, and also threw a bunch of rangers into the fight against the troll. There was some exchange of bowfire, with the goblins finally loosing some black feathered arrows at the rangers on the crag opposite, and killing one, but taking losses in return. The fight against the drake was a disaster for the rangers. It rampaged through them, spending it's Might, killing 4. (hmmm, re-reading the rules, might have been a mistake here - does the drake not double it's attacks like cavalry when it charges, but only knocks people down? Looks like that is correct and we were playing it wrong.)The troll also battered a few rangers into the dirt. The wargs fared less well, with one slain and the other driven off. I think my opponent learned a valuable lesson about fights in
LOTR here. In the One Page Rules systems, piling attacks onto a big model will eventually bring it down. But in
LOTR, a high Fight model with a lot of attacks has a decent chance of winning vs a huge group and taking no damage at all. Possible mistake here - I think maybe those riders left at the end of the fight should also be knocked down? Ah well.
The dust settled and things suddenly looked quite grim for the Rangers of the North!
Automatically Appended Next Post: Turn 4
The Good side grabbed the initiative and a single ranger bravely advanced to take on the drake and delay it. The horsemen charged the hill, and the brave rangers facing the troll charged in again, with some support from another horseman.
The goblins crested the hill and charged in to support the troll, distracting the rangers at it's rear, and also rushed to try and swarm down the horsemen charging their fellows on the far side of the hill. The wargs continued to opportunistically harry the horsemen.
More bowfire was exchanged, killing a single goblin. Then it was on to the melee. The troll was overwhelmed by his opponents this time, who spent some Might to bring him down. The drake swallowed the ranger fighting it in one gulp. The charging horsemen had mixed success, with one being unhorsed by goblin spears and the other slaying his foe.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Oh, couple of last shots of turn 4!
I had mislabelled these as turn 5, but the Troll is in them...
Turn 5
Evil took priority again, and the drake slithered it's way up toward the hill, threatening the two rangers who were among the goblins on the crest. The bow armed Captain moved down to support the drake, in case any heroics were required. The wargs continued to harry the mounted rangers, with two running into the small unengaged group and tying them up, preventing them from supporting their comrades on the hill or shooting. Apart from that, the situation on the hill started to descend into a brawl, with goblins scurrying to try and overwhelm the brave rangers through force of numbers. The rangers on the hill continued to plough toward the goblin captain holding his mob together as the rangers on the bottom slopes pushed up to attack the goblins above them.
Bowfire from the goblins was ineffective, but despite very few shots being loosed by the rangers, another wound was knocked off the drake, leaving it on it's last wound.
The combats swirled but neither side could gain clear advantage - a couple of slain wargs, another ranger downed by the press of goblins. However, the sheer numbers the Evil force had were starting to tell on the rangers.
Turn 6
Evil kept priority, and the Drake rampaged up the hill toward the now lone ranger, unhorsed. The ranger set his spear...
As far as I can remember, the battle continued to swirl on the hill, with the rangers grinding into the goblin shield wall and killing some more Wargs, but the main event was ranger vs. drake. I think I was miscalculating and rolled too many attacks, but if so, karma got me because this was the Drake's fight roll:
Then the ranger stabbed the drake, and rolled a 6 to wound, followed it up with a 5 to get through it's defense, and I rolled a 3 for it's fate point! The mighty drake was slain in a huge morale boost for the rangers. The lone ranger stood surrounded by foes, black blood steaming from his spear.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Turn 7
This is where the sweeping action concentrates down to a messy brawl atop the hill. Every ranger who could get there was charging into the goblins, who were scurrying to try and use their weight of numbers to pull down opponents. The rangers, now exhausted of Might points, struggled to bring down the Goblin Captains, who lead the defense of the hill and struck down their opponents. But the Captains couldn't be everywhere, and the rangers were slaying the lesser goblins faster than they were being slain themselves. Both armies hit their break points at the end of this turn.
Turn 8
The start of this turn was filled with tension about where the heroes of each force were, and which should activate first to call their comrades to stand fast. The rangers had only one unhorsed ranger left with a Might point, so he went first and succeeded on his Courage test. The Goblin Captain on top of the hill wavered but spent a Will point to also pass his test, keeping his minions in line. The combat ground on, with the Rangers making some gains but also taking some losses, and the leaderless rangers on the far crag began to flee the field due to failed Courage tests. The game ended, and the goblins weight of numbers told, just, to give the goblins the victory.
A great game, with lots of swings back and forth. I'm a bit annoyed at myself for mis-reading the rule about the drake's charge, I had it in my head as "charges like monstrous cavalry" but the wording is a bit more tight than that. That definitely resulted in one extra death that shouldn't have happened, but there again, we forgot to do Terror tests for charging the Troll and the Drake and to knock down all the horses in that combat, so perhaps it balances out?
I think my opponent played quite well, and any mistakes were due to habits formed from One Page Rules. I think the trade off between mobility and shooting was a tricky thing to balance, and I think it's a great example of the extra depth in this game. He had a tough problem to deal with in the drake, and he really focused on it til it was dead. But it consumed all his resources and left him with tired and outnumbered rangers in the final clash.
For me, this game really confirmed my memories of this as an excellent wargame with an elegant ruleset that encourages formation play but allows for huge flexibility in action. I really could feel the difference compared to One Page Rules, the priority system and heroic actions is a lot more engaging than alternating activation in some ways. I loved how the forces looked on the table and seeing everything play out.
The MVPs for me I think were the Wargs. Very cheap, but their tactical uses way outweighed their points cost, disrupting my opponents moves and tying him up, preventing him from using his mobility advantage against me.
It'll be a while before we get to play again, but I think it would be interesting to add Aragorn to the Rangers side to bring it up to 750. I'd add the Goblin King, a Warg Chieftain, a troll and a few extra goblins to get it to 750 as well. I'd use the Black Gate Aragorn - I know, not actually part of this list, but the Aragorn in this list can't be mounted and doesn't get Anduril, and I think my friend would have a lot of fun with a proper mounted beatstick hero!
