HOTT Summer 2012 Part Two: Year One of the Campaign

Saturday morning saw the start of the actual campaign. There were some minor change-ups to the armies: John decided that calling the Jezails “artillery” didn’t work out and thought they’d be much m ore useful as “shooters”. I replaced the Magicians with some spear and shooters that I’d just finished up. And David showed up in the morning with an Aitboat model that he’d just finished up… Now, my first instinct was to say “um… no”. I see there as sort of being some natural balance in my armies – there aren’t a lot a really gimmicky things, no one army has things that the other armies can’t really deal  with… but it was such a neat model… and I thought “how bad can Airboats be…?” Well…

FORCES

Player: Bob

Army: Centaurs

Country: Petroland

Cities: Pavet, Mynet, Pavet

Starting Army:

1x Magician General (Centaur Shamen)

1x Knight (Armoured Centaurs)

2x Shooters (Satyrs)

7x Riders (Centaurs)

Player: Tim

Army: Japanese

Country: Manga

Cities: Shojo, Gekiga, Kodomo

Starting Army:

1x Knight General (Mounted Samurai)

1x Artillery (Cannon!)

1x Sneaker (Ninjas!)

4x Shooters (Ashigaru Archers)

3x Spear (Ashigaru Spearmen)

1x Rider (More Samurai…)

Player: David

Army: English Civil War

Country: New Angland

Cities: Kong Hong, Hangshai, Haiwei, Sintien

Starting Army:

1x Cleric General

2x Shooters (Musketeers)

4x Spear (Pikemen)

1x Knight (Cuirassier)

1x Airboat (

1x Dragon (um… pretty self-explanitory)

Player: John

Army: Ratlings

Country: Myomorpha

Cities: Monsei, Leithia, Hamelin

Starting Army:

1x Magician (Ratling Wizard)

2x Shooters (Jezails)

10x Hordes (Rats, sir, fousands of ‘em)

3x Blade (big , bad, nasty rats)

THE GAME

Year One Declaractions

Myomorpha declared war on New Angland. New Angland declared war on Myomorpha. Pertoland declared war on Myomprpha and New Angland. And Manga declared war on EVERYONE!? So… I think everyone was at war with everyone…

Spring Deployment

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

Manga deployed in Kodomo, just to keep everyone guessing. New Angland deployed in Hangshai. Petroland deployed in Logit. Myomorpha deployed in Leithia.

Spring Moves

Manga sailed across the straights of oil – losing two elements in the process to besiege the Petroland fortress (corral?) at Mynet – but was unable to breach their defences (losing another element). The Centaur Herd galloped into New Angland and besieged Sintien, but was likewise unable to bring the New Anglanders to give up their land.

The New Anglanders, not knowing where they might be attacked from held in Hangshai. The attack came from the west and the vermin hordes stormed in from Leithia.

The Battle of Hangshai

The Rats try to cross the river into Hangshai.

John and David.

David moved his troops up to the river and then mostly just hung out while his Airboat sailed around and destroyed things on the flanks…

There’s a pic of his model. Not really to scale with the rest of the minis… but still very pretty.

The Dragon DID show up…

But I think it went straight for the Ratlings wizard general which scared it off with a shower of sparks and loud banging firecrackers!?

The battle raged on.

A column of rats made it across the river and made a break for the stronghold.

I think this ended with the New Anglander’s Cleric General being beaten down by the big bat rats (or maybe the wizard in a general on general throwdown…?) I can’t remember, but the Rats won, took Hangshai and the New Anglanders retired to Kong Hong.

(while this was going on Bob and I played a fun game… during which I was totally distracted, trying to listen to what David and John were up to – as neither have played the game a lot… probably should have just spectated, ah well… )

Summer

(dagnabbit! I totally forgot to keep up with the taking pictures of the map moves…)

In the summer the Centaurs of Petroland gave up their siege of Sintien and galloped across the plains to relieve the siege of Mynet. The Rats pursued the New Anglanders to Kong Hong.

The Battle of Kong Hong

Giant Rat Horde in column to pass between the rock and the hard place David had thrown out for him.

The New Anglanders deployed at their very base line hoping that would buy them time for their Dragon to arrive and save the day!

It did and it did, chewing through the Ratty column along side the Airboat.

The Battle of Mynet

The Centaurs relieve the Corral of Mynet along the River Effluent.

Riders Charge down the Cannon on my right, while the rest of the line reorganizes.

With the artillerymen driven off the Centaurs turned to ride up my flank.

I did actually get the sneakers into contact with the General!? But they didn’t prove to be all that useful…

I can’t remember the details of the rest of the battle… and apparently didn’t take any other pics…? But it ended badly for me and we were forced to give up our foothold on the mainland and retire back to manga.

Autumn

(Again with no picture of the map moves... drat!) 

In their hasty retreat back across the straights, the army of Manga suffered further losses and decided it would be best to just continue retiring all the way to the capitol and rest and rebuild for the following year.

The Rats retired back to Leithia, and the Army of New Angland marched on Hangshai to lay siege to it… but failed to exterminate the rats within....

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

 The War rages on with YEAR TWO of the campaign!