Sunday, April 8, 2012

Hordes of the Things Again

As we didn’t have Campaign Quorum for out Savage Worlds Dragonlance Campaign, Dave and Patrick and I played a couple games of Hordes of the Things last night.

I thought I’d try to incorporate a few of the new ideas from the DBA 3.0 drafts I’ve seen. We used the 100 paces = 1 Base Width and recoiling into something before completing a full recoil distance didn’t kill you. There may have been other things I inadvertently used (because it’s been so long since I’ve actually played HOTT and ran a lot of games of the February draft of 3.0 in recent months…). Because we were using a bigger playing area and the greater movement we also used the set up distance (300 paces from the table center.

GAME ONE

For the first game Dave and Patrick squared off. Dave took Orcs and Patrick took Dwarves.

FORCES

Dwarves
1x Hero General (Bear Rider)
1x Beast (Giant Armoured Badgers)
2x Shooters (Dwarven Handgunners)
7x Blade (Dwarf Warriors)

Orcs
1x Behemoth General (Red Giant)
2x Behemoths (Cyclops and Trolls)
2x Beasts (Wolves)
1x Warband (Orcs Warriors)
2x Riders (Orc Wolf Riders)

THE GAME


(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


The Dwarven battleline prepares to cross into Orc territory…


The orcs and their Giant Overlords prepare to meet the Dwarvish invaders.


First moves; The Dwarves begin their river crossing.


AS the Dwarven Handgunners cross they are met by packs of wolves streaming out of the woods.


One unit of Dwarven Shooters is overrun by the wolves in the river, while the other unit holds their ground… (Dwarves are down ONE)


A Group of Dwarf Warriors makes it across the river and battles an Orc Warband lurking near the edge of the woods.


The Dwarf Warriors are thrown back into the river and the second unit of Handgunners is overrun! (Dwarves are down TWO!)


The Giant Armoured Badgers make it across the river and immediately turn around to chase down the wolves that have overrun the Dwarf Handgunners. Meanwhile a group of Dwarves that crossed near the undefended ford form up into a column and prepare to march on the Orcs stronghold – conveniently located right next to the road…


The Wolves are destroyed by the Giant Badgers (Dwarves have lost two, Orcs have lost one)


A unit of Dwarf Warriors peels off from the main line to defend their side of the river and keep the wolves from crossing.


The Wolves push the Warriors back from the riverbank and into the woods beyond and a group of Orc Wolf Riders had driven across the rear of the Orc line to block the advancing Dwarves.


The Wolves tear apart the Dwarf Warriors they drove into the woods. (Dwarves have lost three, Orcs have lost one)


The Wolf riders that met the Warriors on the road in the open did not fare so well…. (Dwarves have lost three, Orcs have lost two)


Again the Giant Armoured Badgers attempt to chase down some marauding wolves, while the Dwarves Bear-riding General crosses the river to face the Cyclops!


The Wolves are once again shredded by the Giant Armoured badgers and the Dwarf General takes down the Cyclops! The tables have turned! (Dwarves have lost three, Orcs have lost the rough equivalent of FIVE!)


The Dwarvish Warriors push on up the road while the Orcs Red Giant General moves over the face the Dwarvish Bear-Riding General…


The Dwarf General is pushed back into the river.


The Dwarf General continues to give ground (but not GIVE UP!) and is pushed back to his side of the river with the Orcs Giant General in hot pursuit!


Dwarf Warriors that had been battling the Orc Warband for a number of turns, were finally overcome. Those not killed were scattered into the river in panic… many drowned the few that made it back to the far side of the river were too few in number to be of any further help in the battle… (Dwarves have lost four, Orcs have lost five)


The Giant Armoured Badgers come to their General’s aid…


… and the Orcs’ Giant General is taken down! The Dwarves win the day!!


GAME TWO

I thought I’d have a go so I busted out my Pre-Feudal Scotts and Patrick decided to take the Romans. As I turned out to be the attackers we decided that it would be a Scots/Pictish raid on a Roman Mile Fort somewhere along Hadrian’s Wall..

FORCES

Scots (Picts)
1x Warband General
1x Warband (Scots Warriors)
7x Spear (Scots Warriors)
2x Shooters (Scots Archers)
1x Riders (Scots Cavalry)

Romans
1x Hero General (Heroic Centurion)
2x Riders (Roman Cavalry)
1x Lurker (Roman skirmishers)
1x Artillery (Roman Bolt Throwers)
4x Blade (Roman Legionaries)
2x Spear (Roman Auxiliaries)


The Scots form up to attack the Romans – who are in a pretty solid defensive position….


The Scotts slowly begin their advance… Their cavalry harasses the right of the Roman line.


Roman Skirmishers, hidden in the marsh, ambush the Scots archers.

Because a) I was actually playing, and b) the advance was slow and methodical (or as close to methodical as you could ever expect of ME!?) I ended up not taking a lot of pictures. The Roman cavalry charged the Scots Archers that were lurking at the edge of the march (after having chased off the Roman Skirmishers) The Roman cavalry rode down one band of archers (Scots down one)


The second time the Roman Cavalry charged they were cut to pieces by the remaining band of archers (one-one)


Not wanting to bother with the Blade sitting on the hill I decided to concentrate my efforts on the flanks…


The Scots cavalry rode around behind the Romans but was perhaps a bit too hasty in their attack…


AT the other end of the line there was a mess of cavalry and blade and spear and warband all bashing about.


The Scots cavalry met their end at the back of the roman line… (Scots lost two, Romans lost one)


The Romans then lost another cavalry unit to the relentless attacks of the Scots General’s Warbands. (Scots lost two, Romans lost two)


The Heroic Roman General, now pretty much surrounded was cut down and the rest of the cohort fled the field in disarray…

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

More Greek Myth stuff… These games have got me fired up about getting my Hoplite armies done though… so expect to see some of them rolling off the line soon-ish…

No comments:

Post a Comment