Battle Record - Middle Earth Goblin Town Vs Easterlings, Game 3 #MESBG

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been playing MESBG again at Warhammer World! We had signed up for a midweek event again, just 500pts, 3 games. But this time we went down the day before, had a game and stayed overnight, so we were fresh the next day to do battle. But the 

Here's my 500 point warband with the 'might bank' from the captain's to buff the King with the Scribe.

• The Goblin King with 10 Goblins and Gollum
• Grinnah with 10 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 8 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 8 Goblins

Last game and I was up against Bryn Soane, he'd faced Ben in round one and lost 9:2. I assume he'd lost his second game and dropped to the bottom with me, still on table 19 [I couldn't go any lower]

• Amdur, Lord of the Blades
• 9 Easterling warriors, halberd and shield
• 6 Black dragon warriors, halberd
• Easterling Dragon Knight
• Easterling Captain
• 6 Easterling warriors, halberd and shield
• 2 Easterling warriors, bow

As you can see To The Death and we're both already on 2 VPs, because neither of us have banners. But the next victory condition makes it even worse. If you have a banner and I don't your scoring another 2 VPs at the end of the game. That means I have to take out the banner, else I allow you the score AND, there's no way I can score that because I can't take them! Luckily neither could Bryn, and I don't usually swear on the blog, but it's bull💩! 

Anyway, we faced off and I discover a couple of the Easterling Heroes have Elven blades, because of course they would. With the Goblin King once again at risk I will have to tread carefully.

We eventually managed to meet in the middle and the Lord of Blades issued an Heroic Challenge to the King, which he promptly dismissed. If they faced each other he'd be at a disadvantage but someone called the Lord of Blades with and Elf weapon was not a challenge I fancied. He did face the Captain though and managed to kill him, stuffing him into a sack as a prisoner for a VP.

Grinnah tried his best too, but wasn't able to double up on prisoners. I think it was a pretty even battle at this point. The Easterlings were hard to kill and with Halberds Bryn could often get 2 spear supports to my one. But every loss he took was a bigger deal, because I had Goblins just waiting in the wings to join combat.

As more of my Goblins died I was able to spread out and start tri-point trapping units. This gave me lots more to wound rolls, which started to turn the tide. But Grinnah was killed and Gollum put on the ring walked through everyone and tried to kill the Lord of Blades who'd got into combat with the Goblin King. Unfortunately he couldn't separate him out and would subsequently succumb to the Ring and wander off. But it didn't matter as the King wone the duel, bashed Amdur silly and took him prisoner instead of the Captain.

With more traps happening I was able to whittle down the Easterlings to quarter and the Goblin King kill the last remaining Hero, but he wasn't as fancy as the Lord of Blades and we definitely wanted to remove that Elven blade to protect our Goblins.

So the end result, with prisoners was 19:4. Unbelievable how this went. I can't quite work out if it was good dice. Maybe it was having all the Goblins together? I think if I go again I'll not take Gollum. He didn't seem to do very much. Although his chance to peel off Amdur had my heart racing for a moment.  Another 8 Goblins feel like they'd be more useful and even easier to manage - no extra rules to contend with.

With that result we ended up with Otty 32nd, me 22nd, and Ben 15th out of 38. I think that's my best ever result. It was only the massive score at the end that allowed me to jump from the bottom to the mid-league. Once again though I never felt like they didn't have a chance. OK, maybe just a bot with Otty as I knew the Wargs were more mobile to secure the objectives and cavalry charges would be my downfall. But, I did much better with them than the objectively more competitive Army of the Dead. So it just goes to show. I think with more practice I'd be stronger with Goblins, so that's what I'm going to do.

Battle Record - Middle Earth Goblin Town Vs Sharku and Wargs, Game 2 #MESBG

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been playing MESBG again at Warhammer World! We had signed up for a midweek event again, just 500pts, 3 games. But this time we went down the day before, had a game and stayed overnight, so we were fresh the next day to do battle. But the 

Here's my 500 point warband.

• The Goblin King with 10 Goblins and Gollum
• Grinnah with 10 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 8 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 8 Goblins

Second game and just look who I was drawn against! Can't get away from this guy! However, I had been curious to see how Goblin Town would fare against his army after the trouncing I had with the Army of the Dead the previous week.

• Sharku
• 5 Warg riders, shields and throwing spears
• 2 Warg riders, shields
• 2 Warg rides, bows
• 2 Wargs
• Orc captain with warg
• 4 Warg riders, shields and throwing spears
• 1 Warg rider, throwing spears
• 2 Warg riders, shields
• 2 Warg rides, bows
• 2 Wargs
• Orc shaman with warg
• 6 Wargs

Alternating warband setup and Otty had positioned to capture the drum on my left. I had half a mind to setup opposite and just bash him. Or I could set up on the right which was empty. Instead I did neither and sat on my home objective. So inevitably he took the right objective so I just threw all three remaining warbands at the right side trusting that inexplicable palisade would cause him more problems than me. 

And it did, he had to send a party back and round to come at my extreme right flank. I kept my home objective secure but had every intention of abandoning it

I think I managed to do quite well in the middle but my board control was shot to pieces. That palisade became my MVP keeping cavalry at bay.

I was totally convinced the Wargs had an 8" move, didn't move my goblins far enough away and they got charged afterall and I had to fight for my home objective. I think I may have killed Sharku with the Goblin King

So with Otty sat on most of the objectives he took the win 9:5

Battle Record - Middle Earth Goblin Town Vs Lothlorien, Game 1 #MESBG

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been playing MESBG again at Warhammer World! We had signed up for a midweek event again, just 500pts, 3 games. But this time we went down the day before, had a game and stayed overnight, so we were fresh the next day to do battle. But the 

Here's my 500 point warband.

• The Goblin King with 10 Goblins and Gollum
• Grinnah with 10 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 8 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 8 Goblins

First game and it was Wyn Price who'd brought Lothlorien:

• Celeborn
• 6 Galadhrim Warriors, shield and Lorien guard
• 4 Galadhrim Warriors, shield, spear and Lorien guard
• Wood Elf Sentinel
• Lothlorien warrior with banner
• Haldir
• 5 Lothlorien warrior with bow
• 7 Lothlorien warrior with spear

Hold Ground was the mission... 😡 once again I start the game with my opponent scoring 2VPs because I don't have a banner. Or more accurately I CAN'T take a banner even if I wanted to! 🤬 Sure if I can kill his banner I get the 2VPs too, but you opponent shouldn't be scoring them for doing nothing before the game has even started. Rant over [for now].

OK, I only took two pictures so there's no report. I was deeply annoyed that these pesky elves were going around singing their own [so-called] songs! They were disgusting warbles to me, nothing like the Goblin King's beautiful voice. Ordinarily I'd have gone straight to the objective and forced him fight me off it. But with Maelstrom [the King decided not to turn up in turn 1] and no Scribe to call Heroic March across the entire board I thought I'd let him have it. I hid my right force in that ruin.

Which I then won priority in the second turn which made me regret not going straight for the centre to get position. But in the end that force Wyn to focus on my right and [mostly] ignore my left force. Except transfixing the Goblin King. Ultimately we ended up trying to surround the objective with what we had left. Wyn had done a much better job because his warbands all came on together. He could focus on half my army with support. That meant he thought I had much more Goblins on the objective than elves.

But I had 16 to his 21. Throw in the King and Celeborn - your warlord is Dominant 3, so worth 3 points but they cancelled each other out. So Wyn won out 9:0, was the wooden spoon within my grasp?

I then went for a coffee and cake in Bugman's, while Ben and Otty disappeared so I was all Billy no mates!

Some of the best painted miniature entries.

Gwaihir went on to win the competition.

The trolls were fun.

And a  custom Balrog, that did not miss leg day!

Battle Record - Middle Earth Army of the Dead Vs Shadows of Angmar? #MESBG 09/07/26

Afternoon #Warhammer Community we've been playing MESBG again. This time Army of the Dead with Aragorn Vs maybe Shadows of Angmar. There was definitely Gulavhar, Werewolves, Spectres and a Shade

The mission had three objectives, with the centre one worth more, and even more if your general was controlling it. As usual the memories are sketchy but I'll probably recall things as I go along. I had considered taking Army of the Dead to the next Midweek MESBG in September, so this would be a fun way to see what they're about. Fast is one thing. My warband in the bottom left managed to get up to the corner ruin and then next turn just float over/through it!

Gulavhar then took their place to keep out of the way. 

Meanwhile Wargs and werewolves trapped a few ghosts, but could not kill them because they're so darn tough.

Gulavhar go in behind our defence of the centre objective. Will was very certain things would end successfully for him, his dad not so much.

I think we started to lose a few ghosts

And then we trapped Gulavhar.

But the dice were not with us! 🎲🎲🎲😱

I think we eventually got broken and so the game came to an end. Otty and Will had managed to get more round the objectives. We'd been tough but invariably neither side had been able to capitalise much when winning a duel. Just killing enough and ending the game in a better position had won the game for them.

A lot of fun. Jury is out on whether I'd prefer to take them in September, maybe some more games needed? Liam is away on holiday for the next two weeks now, so it'll be limited attendance for shed night.

Battle Report - Middle Earth Goblin Town Vs Reclamation of Osgiliath, Game 3 #MESBG

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been playing MESBG again at Warhammer World! We had signed up for a midweek event again, just 500pts, 3 games. But this time we went down the day before, had a game and stayed overnight, so we were fresh the next day to do battle. But the 

Here's my 500 point warband with the 'might bank' from the captain's to buff the King with the Scribe.

• The Goblin King with 10 Goblins
• Grinnah with 6 Goblins
• The Scribe with 6 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 6 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 6 Goblins

Third game and it was Andy Munt and his Reclamation of Osgiliath. Andy was by far the most efficient person I've gamed with. We set out everything particular about the armies, how we played and he kept track of my usage of Might and wounds. To have the spare brain capacity to do that and keep track of what your own army is doing, while freely admitting neither of us were playing for any competitive honours. I was just really impressed

• Boromir, Banner of Minas Tirith, Horse and Shield
• 2 Knights of Minas Tirith
• 5 Warriors of Minas Tirith with Shield
• 5 Warriors of Minas Tirith with Spear and Shield
• Madril, Captain of Ithilien
• 4 Rangers of Gondor with Spear
• 2 Rangers of Gondor
• 2 Warriors of Minas Tirith with Shield
• 2 Warriors of Minas Tirith with Spear and Shield

It's been over a week now and I've forgotten a lot of what happened. I think the game was Assassination, we had to kill enemy heroes, but Boromir has 6 Might! Anyway, having been caught out many times trying to defend small enclosed fields I sent my army round the outside.

And just kept going, with Andy saying he thought I was being much more aggressive than he expected. We had a couple more turns of trying to get a decent position, but I think we were over half way at this point and possibly the only thing that had died was a goblin the King had thrown. I did put a few goblins in the field though just in case they could be helpful

With time running out I think I barged a Ranger out of the way to get to Boromir but he was too far away. I did this knowing full well I'd probably be trapped the next turn and I was. But his blubbery mass was just too effective. They may have put one wound on him but Fate denied it so no VPs. Meanwhile my left flank was doing a bit better in that I'd trapped both cavalry I think it took a couple of turns but I was eventually able to take them down. But they weren't characters so no points for that.

I think we were quickly running out of time so we just played some of the more pivotal fights involving characters. Unfortunately I can't remember if the King died. All I know is the final score was 10:0 to Andy.

This was a good game, my only issue being that the tactical play we had at the beginning had to be abandoned recklessly just so we got stuck in. I really would have liked a bit more time on this one. I was a bit more successful in winning fights. There were quite a few more dead Gondorians, just not the ones that scored points. So as one-sided as the score says I once again left feeling that Goblin Town is a good list. I may well have come 40th out of 46 but I didn't feel beaten. Yes the Haradrim battle was a bit challenging but it's definitely a challenge I'd like us to explore in the shed to se ehow to counter it.

In the end Otty came 10th and Ben came 27th. But Ben actually won best painted miniature with his Radagast riding Gwaihir [giant eagle]. Absolutely well deserved.

We finished up with tea in Bugman's I had the pulled pork loaded fries, which were really good. Although the sweet chilli chicken strips Ben had also looked really nice.  

We have another midweek MESBG due in September. I may consider taking Scott's army of the dead, plus some of the Three Hunters. We'll have to see what makes sense. It might be too nuanced for me.

Battle Report - Middle Earth Goblin Town Vs Garrison of Ithilien, Game 2 #MESBG

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been playing MESBG again at Warhammer World! We had signed up for a midweek event again, just 500pts, 3 games. But this time we went down the day before, had a game and stayed overnight, so we were fresh the next day to do battle. But the 

Here's my 500 point warband with the 'might bank' from the captain's to buff the King with the Scribe.

• The Goblin King with 10 Goblins
• Grinnah with 6 Goblins
• The Scribe with 6 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 6 Goblins
• Goblin captain with 6 Goblins

Second game and it was Jonno Witts and his Garrison of Ithilien. This was his second game. I think he meant with this army, but I think he had played MESBG before, just a long time ago. But it felt like a mentoring role for me as I felt I had more experience, especially after 3 games in as many days.

• Faramir
• Frodo, Mithril coat, Sting, Elven Cloak
• Samwise, Elven cloak
• 5 Rangers of Gondor
• 1 Knight of Minas Tirith with Banner
• 4 Warriors of Minas Tirith with Bows
• Captain of Minas Tirith
• 5 Warriors of Minas Tirith with Shield
• 5 Warriors of Minas Tirith with Spear and Shield

So, Breakthrough - holding your own objective for 1, middle objectives for 1 or 3 if no enemy model and opponents objective for 3 or 5. 

With Jono not having any models on his home objective I was definitely sending my force up the middle.

But it also looked like my left flank was weakened so I sent The Scribe too, so it could be close to vanilla Captains to transfer Might to the King. As the banner came round the right villa I drew back out of sight so I could join up with either the King to break the right, or the left to hold the flank and speed bump my home.

The banner moved back, sending Sam and Frodo for my home, but I'd secured it with some spare goblins. Meanwhile my left flank was just holding the Wariors at bay. I could hardly damage them as their Defence was so high, but if I could slow them down... Meanwhile the King threw himself at Faramir's warband.

For some reason I thought I'd lost this already and pressed even more with the King. I advised Jono to move his banner to the right objective. I had moved too far off it, he didn't charge the lone gobbo on the corner of the ruin, because the King had caused terror. Better to secure the objective than risk failing a c a charge. However, the gobbo lost the duel, but survived the combat, moving back 1" into range of the objective. I speed bumped my home objective to stop the Hobbits scoring. Jono's home objective was mine for 3 I think.    

So the final score was 6:6 I think. The goblin that failed the duel but survived the combat snatching me a draw. Imagine if it had won the duel! Another great game and Jono was great to game with,