Apologies for the delay in posting this, a vicious spell of man-cold left me unwilling to do very much at all yesterday, which unfortunately also included updating the blog. Anyway, after celebrating beating the High Elves I was challenged by the Warriors of Chaos for a non-league, friendly game. It wouldn't become very friendly, I concluded, once I realized what was standing across from me. Lead by a Sorcerer Lord on a Disk, I was faced with two units of 18-20 Warriors, equipped with hand weapons and shields, or halberds, and marked by Tzeentch. Furthermore, a big unit of 40 Marauders with shields and as well marked by Tzeentch rounded off the foot troops. Then he had a Hellcannon, naturally, and a Shaggoth(!) as well as an unit of 8 Chaos Knights. Some Chaos Hounds rounded off the force and the Battle Standard was carried by an Exalted Champion. I noted soberly that my fanatics and manglers squig would have to pull a heavy load.
Things turned worse early on, as they got the initiative and marched forward. Their magic did little, but the Hellcannon nailed my Great Shaman on the Spider with a blast that killed him off immediately without even getting to cast a single spell. Served me right for being smug about the Star Dragon. So for the rest of the game, I'd have to depend on my two level 1 shamans to counter his Tzeentch Lord. Oh well.
My misery continued when my Goblins failed animosity and were forced to charge his warhounds but failing to reach them, setting me up for a very poor, possible counter-charge, with the frenzied halberd Warriors facing my flank. A spell of Itching put them down to movement 1 as they were busy scratching those hard-to-reach places in between the chaos armor, but I was still worried. My shooting took out 2 wounds on the Shaggoth, but I needed to do more.
Having to roll a 10, the Warriors went for it, declaring a flank charge on my Goblins that would enable him to roll up my entire flank if he made it. Faced with such dire possibilities, I felt compelled to flee, and my Goblins led by the BSB fell all the way back to the end of my deployment, an inch or so from running off. This in turn had the frenzied Warriors giving up their flank for the Squig Herd, while the Shaggoth charged a Spear Chukka and took it out. On the other side, I sacrificed my Wolf Boss to angle the Marauders to overrun into the Arachnarok, setting up a flank charge for my Night Goblins.
I realized I had to play very defensively to pull out even a draw, but also realized the flanking opportunities open to me might just be the best chance I would get all game. So in they went, both the Night Goblins into the Marauders fighting the Spider, and my Squig Herd into the frenzied Warriors. I threw out my fanatics to prevent the Tzeentch Warriors from charging my Night Goblins the next turn, were the Marauders to hold, lest they wish to run over two chain-swinging madmen and suffer 4D6 S5 hits. Across the field, with no Warhounds around to sacrifice, the Mangler Squig bounced into the Chaos Knights and took out 7 of 8, then one of the Pump Wagons charged the sole knight in the flank, killing him off. Joined by the Spider, the Night Goblins had little trouble in defeating the Marauders, who were chased down, but the real danger was the Halberd Warriors. Even fighting to their flank, they killed off 5 Squigs, but 21 squig attacks back killed off even more, and the Warriors were testing to break on a 4. Unsuccesfully, it would turn out, and they fled, through fanatics that killed off a handful, and back to their deployment zone. The Rock Lobbers took out two more wounds from the Shaggoth, and the Wolf Riders rode up close and plinked him in the eye with their arrows, finally felling the brute. Suddenly, The Warriors of Chaos were down to two regiments of Warriors, one of them fleeing, the Hellcannon and their Sorcerer Lord on his disk.
Unwilling to surrender, the Tzeentch Warriors charged into the Squig Herd who were a bit stranded after failing to catch their prey, and killed off enough Squigs to break them in combat and go wild, which took the Warriors down to half their number. The recently rallied Goblins and the BSB took a Gateway spell to the face at S11 that whisked them away into the Warp, no questions asked. Luckily, the Hellcannon misfired and blew up, causing a wound to the Sorcerer Lord nearby.
The end of the match saw the Arachnarok Spider get into combat with the Tzeentch Warriors and killing them off completely, but as they were carrying the Rapturous Standard they stuck around long enough for the Exalted BSB to kill off my beastie. The once-frenzied Warriors failed to rally, which set up my remaining Pump Wagon from pumping into it, and since you're not allowed a charge reaction against compulsory movement, the warriors were chased down. At the very end, my Night Goblins led by the Warboss charged in to kill off the solo BSB, for real this time, and to add an almost comical - yet somehow fitting - end to the battle, the remaining Spear Chukka chukked a spear into the Sorcerer Lord with his 3+ ward save, and killed him off, clearing all traces of Chaos from the battlefield.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
