Kings of War Game #2: AKA Mizzard Wodel's Blaze of Glory!

My fortnightly games night featured another 2000 point Kings of War game.  My opponent this time was Pat, he brought his warriors of chaos (ahem, Varangar) and I gave my previous army a little tweak and once again took the pointy ears. Here's what went down.

Armies Set Up

The Armies

My glorious Elven Host consisted of Minty (my dragon with an elven hero strapped onto his back), 2 Stormwind regiments, Mizzard Wodel (my elf wizard who since I've named him seems to survive most games intact), a Tree Herder (really must name him), another wizard, a horde of Tallspears, 2 units of Stormwind cav, a regiment of Kindred archers and 2 units of  Gladestalkers, finally a troop of hunters of The wild completed the host. Opposite me was 3 units of Fallen, 3 Magus conclaves,3 troops of Tundra wolves, a Skald (with Holy hand Grenades), a magus on a mount, a Jabbawock and a mounted regiment of Sons of Korgaan. 

Varangur Set Up

Pat chose the side without the woods which suited me as I always like to skulk in forest with my Elves and he also won the roll for first turn. I'm still in two minds whether I think first turn is a big advantage so I wasn't unhappy about his choice.

Elf Set Up from the Varangur's Viewpoint

Some Sort of Plan is in Order?

The plan (if you can call it that) was to use the woodland to the left to hinder any rock hard Varangur dudes attack my pathfinder type guys whilst sweeping round the left with my fast moving units. The Tree Herder's job was to shore up the centre with the help of the Tallspears. My previous game had the Tallspears not doing very much so I thought a more proactive approach would be better.

After Vanguarding

Ye Olde Turne Onne

Pat advanced up with most of his units in a menacing manner. One little surprise I got was when the central unit of Tundra wolves shot at the Gladestalkers with the War Bow of Kaba. It failed to wound presumably due to not having opposable thumbs or being colourblind. One of the Wizard Conclaves shot/magicked two wounds of my Sabre Toothed Pussycat armed wizard. With that Pat's turn ended.

Treeherders View

Varangar Advance

In my turn I charged the Wolves with the bow with my Tree herder hoping for a swift bit of carnage and a possible rout. I move my dragon and cavalry to advance towards the Fallen but make sure I'm out of their charge range. In the shooting phase the wizard heals herself a bit and the rest of my missile troops put 5 wounds on the Sons of Kurgaan. I show my relative inexperience with this charge as not only do I fail to rout the wolves (only caused 4 wounds), I also set myself up for a flank charge from the Jabbawock. Not good, not good at all.

Elfs Advance

Tricksey Elves know their opponents charge ranges

Turne The Seconde

Pat had a few charge orders to hand out but not to the big nasty gribbly Forsaken as I had made sure there was no elves within charge range of them. One disappointing occurance was my Tree Herder getting flanked by the Jabbawock and a frontal charge by the Tundra Wolves, this was going to require some shite rolling on Pat's behalf here I thought to myself. Also the Tundra wolves on the right charged the Gladestalkers opposite and the Sons of Korgaan charged my hunters of The Wild. Least scary for me was the final unit of Tundra Wolves charging my Stormwind Cavalry. The three magical conclaves didn't achieve much in the shooting phase. In the combats I was surprised to see the Jabbawock and Tundra Wolves bounce off the Tree Herder whilst the other two canine units did minor damage. The Sons of Korgaan wavered the *HOTW. This actually did me a favour as Pat's unit's only option was to charge them again next turn.

Mistake #1: Foolishly Letting a Jabbawock Flank Treeherder

In my turn I flew the dragon round the back of the Wizard Conclave on the left. My Stormwind unit counter charges the Tundra Wolves, the Tallspears charge the second unit of Tundra Wolves, the Tree Herder attempts some payback on the Jabbawock. My Gladestalkers shoot the Wizard Conclave on the hill, Then mistake #2 makes itself apparent as **I decide to breathe all over the Forsaken unit facing the dragon only to have Pat remind me ***I can't shoot gouts of flame as the dragon was shagged out from an at the double move. The Skald is wavered by Elf shooting. In the combat phase the Tallspears rout the tundra wolves as does the Stormwind Cavalry. then come mistake #3. after a little deliberation i decide to advance with my stormwind hoping for a 1-5" advance which would leave me in charge range of the Forsaken, but outside theirs. Unfortunately I rolled a 6 meaning they had a charge to withstand next turn.

Mistakes #2 & #3 Made Here

Poised to Strike!

Balancing Tallspears on a Hill

Varangur give Elves some Good Old Fashioned Boot

The Waiting Game is Played

Ye Olde Turne Three

Shit started to get really real. The Sons of Korgaan had a second go at the Hunters of The Wild, Tundra Wolves into the Gladestalkers, the Jabbawock charged the Tree Herder, all three units of Fallen charged in the Dragon, Stormwind and Tallspears. As this is only my second game I still have some baggage left over from WFB and the placement of the dragon was (I thought) safe from the Fallen charge but I had miscalculated. The wizard cast Bane Chant on the Fallen going into the Dragon and caused a lot of damage! Both of the other Fallen units inflicted a lot of damage and the Tundra wolveses thunderous charge was pretty unpleasant as well. After the damage was calculated and nerve tests taken, the Gladestalkers in the centre, Hunters of the Wild and Stormwind cavalry all scarper. My Tree Herder was pretty lucky as Mr Jabbawock was struggling to do significant damage even with his feeding frenzy. The sons of Korgaan (well Pat really) then had a difficult choice to make, advance towards the centre of the battlefield leaving their backs to the Gladestalkers or face them and have the elves try to evade them by dodging out of their charge arc. In the end he went for the first option. 

Oops, Where's Me Stormwind?

The Great Easterly Varangur Migration

Now it was my turn to roll dice with Pat looking on helplessly! The dragon charged the wizard (mainly to have a chat about the wanton casting of bane chant). My other unit of Stormwind got a flank charge on the Fallen. My Tree Herder got all up in the Jabbawocks grill too. Tallspears charged the Fallen and my Gladestalkers charged the rear of the Sons of Korgaan. I managed to cast Bane Chant on the Gladestalkers rear ending the cavalry. In order of sucess, the comabts went as follows:
Stormwind flanking the Fallen 27 damage, they rout.
Dragon vs Wizard bit of a mismatch, dead wiz.
Gladestalkers vs Sons of Korgaan - cavalry waver like hell.
Tree Herder wavers the Jabbawock.
Tallspears minorly inconvenience the Fallen.
All in all a none too bad turn, could really have done with routing the Fallen with the Tallspears though.

Scouts kicking the shit out of heavy cavalry

The Dragon gets the wizard that was so fond of casting War Chant

Both the wizard and Fallen unit take early baths

Turne The Forthe

In my limited experience of Kings of War, the game usually speeds up around now as a lot of units tend to disappear. This was no exception (to my previous game). The Fallen unit that faced the Tallspears decided to get stuck in, as did the sneaky Tundra Wolves getting a juicy flank attack. The Jabbawock was unable to charge due to wavering so I imagine he just cringed like a dog during a thunderstorm. Both Wizard covens failed to hit anything (probably too much diabolical cackling I reckon). The skald then sashays over to the Kindred Archers and throws a holy hand grenade at them. A successful hit caused 5 wounds on them! This was the gentle reminder to them that they had pressing elf business elsewhere that needed urgent attention, upshot is, they routed. The Fallen/Tundra Wolves double team caused enough damage to make the Tallspears waver. Annoying in the least

Confusing scenes at the start of turn 4

In my turn I charged the rear of the Fallen with my Dragon.  The Tree Herder charged the Jabbawock and my Stormwind cavalry charged into the other unit of Fallen. The elf shooting phase is small but perfectly formed. The Wizard & Gladestalkers combine to cause enough damage of the Sons of Korgaan to make them rout. My mounted wizard is not so impressive as he causes minimal damage on the Tundra Wolves menacing the Tallspears flank. In the melee phase the Tree Herder gets the Jabbawock up to 13 damage then I roll snakes eyes for his nerve test and I have to put up with it for another turn. The Stoemwind cause about 7 damage to the Fallen on the left but not enough to rout them. The Dragon absolutely obliterates the Fallen who disappear in a hot steamy cloud of blood sweat and mutated elbows!

Another unit of Fallen bite the dust

Turn Penultimate

Things were teetering in the balance, I had a lot more points still on the table but a lot of units were heavily beat up. Pat needed to make this turn count, as yes he did! The Jabbawock charged back into Tree Herder (I think both were getting sick of the sight of each other at this stage), the last remaining Fallen unit counter charged the Stormwind and the ****Dags charged back into the flank of the Tallspears. the Wizard Covens earn their (probably) exorbitant fees by promptly blowing my dragon to kingdom come. Speaking of explosions the Skald lobs another grenade, this time at the Gladestalkers, routing them. In the combats both the Tallspears and Stormwind exit the battle a turn or two earlier than I had hoped, leaving me with not many models to move around. I must commend Pat on his ruthless efficiency this turn as he turned my fairly promising force into a pile of cack in a few deft dice rolls. One positive in this turn as the Tree Herder remained fighting fit against the Jabbawock.

Things look rosy

The Tree Herder once again charges the Jabbawock. Mizzard Wodel fireballs the tundra Wolves to oblivion, and the other mage heals herself as she was looking like a target from the nearest Coven. The Tree Herder finally routs the Jabbawock and the turn ends.

Not so much now

Elven housekeeping

Turne The Sixeth

This turn was mercifully short. There was no charges from Pat and he moved his skald so he was well out of anyone's charges. The coven Mages shoot 5 damage of the Tree Herder but he remains resolute (thank any interested deities). 

All I manage to achieve in my turn is to waver the skald with a fireball courtesy of Mizzard. We roll to see if there is a turn 7 and luckily (for me) there isn't. The picture below has all the surviving models in the shot. we total up our victory points and the difference is within 75 points so a rather hard fought and exciting draw! 

Everybody's Dead!

Conclusion

Well that was brutal! From a personal point of view I made a couple of mistakes that very nearly cost me the game. Worst one was completely forgetting that a dragon at the doubling cannot fire. a bit of patience would have served me a lot better there, also the Stormwind advancing after the destroyed the Tundra wolves, I had a one in six chance of getting charged next turn, and it didn't work out. Even though it cost me the Stormwind, I'm sure my eternal optimism would force me to do it again. Another error I think was not moving the wavering Tallspears, they received a flank charge from the Tundra wolves who are pretty unpleasant on the charge. Not sure if I was able to turn and face but it may have kept them there for another turn. Kudos to Pat for taking off 885 points in turn five which really turned the game around. I had a blast and am really enjoying learning this new game.

Thanks for reading.

* Hunters Of The Wild, duh!
** Not me really, the dragon model.
*** Again, not me really.
**** Dags = dogs.