Battle Report - Middle Earth Battle Companies - Escape from Dwarrowdelf

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity it's Middle Earth Monday! I've been playing #MESBG [Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game] at Otty's again. He recently finished some terrain to use for the Escape from Dwarrowdelf scenario. Here the Fellowship have abandoned Balin's Tomb and are running across narrow walkways, assaulted by Moria Goblins. 

In this case Liam had to get 5 of the party off the walkways, 1 of which must be Frodo. As the Goblin player I rolled a D6 to see how many goblins come on [Cave Troll is worth 5, Sergeant is worth 3]. Then I roll a dice to see where they come on. 1, from the right, 2-5 the left and 6 they can climb on anywhere, except a section that has a member of the fellowship on. Lastly, when doubles are rolled for Priority a 1" chasm can be placed by me anywhere on the walkway, but not within 32 of another chasm or on top of a model.

I rolled a 5 right off the bat for reinforcements and decided to bring the troll on straight away while Liam rushed the Fellowship along the path.

I continued to move forward with 1 additional Goblin joining the fight. Legolas hangs back as a rearguard, just in case I roll and 6s. Gandalf casts blinding light and channels it to ensure all my future shots are at -1 to hit [hitting on 6s]

Boromir, Aragorn and Gimli [BAG] are nearly on the Troll and I bring on a Goblin Sergeant for added support. The Troll suffers a wound, I think from Legolas who's still holding the rear. 

DOUBLES! a yawning chasm opens up between the Troll and BAG, I'm hoping someone is going to fall down it as they jump across but before that Gandalf casts a spell to control the Troll moving it back. I'm happy with that as it gives more space for BAG to jump across but then I discover the Troll is unable to hit back in combat...

Which means he's easily bested in combat by the heroes.

A fair few reinforcements have joined the Goblins. Merry fell jumping over the chasm and as Pippin leaned over to see if he somehow survived 4 newly arrived archers fire all their shots at him. 

Even under Gandalf's blinding light the find their mark and he falls to his cousin's resting point.

DOUBLES! Another chasm opens up, forcing Boromir and Gimli to jump across without Aragorn. More archers join the goblins but with no success. Gandalf jumps across the chasm and Legolas races to catch up with his friends. 

DOUBLES! Yet another chasm prevents Gimli from advancing any further. 4 archers appear on the far right with Legolas catching up. Gandalf and Aragorn jump the 2nd chasm. At this stage I'm relying on chasms to kill off the Fellowship.

I won the priority but there was a bit of a mix up with a Mighty Advance move Liam going first, all sorts happened, Gimli fell jumping the final chasm and some Goblins were killed. Unfortunately the order was wrong and we had to reset, which is lucky I have photographic evidence of where we were at. The Hobbits jumped the chasm.

So Gimli survives his leap this time but Boromir does not, I think he was actually killed in combat, trapped against the chasm I had the Goblin sergeant, plus spear support shove him off. Aragorn jumped across to avenge hit sword brother.

More Goblins were waiting to come on while the archers on the left had to start running to catch up as Legolas was 2 chasm's from escape. Gandalf had fallen, but the Hobbits had made the last jump. The Fellowship could suffer no more casualties or their mission would fail.

The Hobbits escape with Aragorn and Gimli holding the doorway to prevent anymore Goblins coming on.

Legolas makes the first chasm.

And with graceful Elven dexterity makes the final leap to join what remained of the Fellowship.

So I lost [again], but like my attempt at Balin's Tomb there are far more dead than survived in the film. I mean who is going to stand against the Balrog in the next mission now Gandalf has died? This was a lot of fun with the chasms with chants of "anything but a 1" reverberating round the shed with each jump and howls of joy/frustration when someone failed their leap test. Some of the other guys have tried the mission since with hardly any chasms appearing. There was also debate about me bringing the Troll on so soon - he may well have been more useful toward the end. But, he forced Liam to burn up Might points early on to secure its demise, which meant they couldn't alter the fate leaping or in combat - six of one, half a dozen of the other...

Middle Earth Moria Goblin Prowlers - TO DONE!

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been #PaintingWarhammer on my Moria Goblin Prowlers for #MESBG It still smarts how I didn't realise it wouldn't be that much more for twice as many of them. It's actually worse that I'm not a huge fan of the actual stats

They're an promotion for archers, but you end up with less range.

They have some extra rules - double handed weapons, backstabber and throwing knives, which means a little more finesse and understanding  is needed. That's something I have in short supply.

But, I'll be storing them at Otty's alongside the rest of my warband so if he ever needs [just] 4 Prowlers [with my kitbashed one] he may make use of them.

I added some Incubi Darkness and Dark Reaper highlights to the black cloth for some variety.

The common red hoods and darker clothing for hiding in the shadows seemed appropriate. Naturally this is my favourite, mainly because the eyes seemed to have worked.

Having just done these I've also got another Blackshield with spear kitbashed by Otty and he also had a spare Moria Goblin King Durbûrz he won in a much better ebay auction to paint up...

So, the first GREAT Big RUSTY Stamp of Approval for the 2022/23 Hobby Season.

Middle Earth Moria Goblin Prowlers - BIG BUILD TO DONE!

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been #PaintingWarhammer on my Moria Goblins for #MESBG I had seen three of these metal Prowlers on ebay at £4.50 or so for a while and I thought they could be a great bargain. I mentioned them to Otty but didn't hear anything back.

Naturally, come the end of the auction they shot up in price  but I still got a thrill at the end as my maximum bid of £12 won the auction for £11.50. Add on the £4.50 postage and I was quite pleased with myself.

Until Otty messaged me an hour later to say they are back in production on GW's website and you can get 6 for £18! More fool me. Still, they came and I got them glued into their bases, glued sand onto their bases and got them primed.

On went some rough and garish base colours ready for washes and highlights.

 I get a Great Big Big Build RUSTY Stamp of Approval for the build.

And a Great Big RUSTY Big Build Base Stamp of Approval for the basing!

Battle Report - Middle Earth Battle Companies - Chance Encounter

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity - I've been playing #MESBG [Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game] at Otty's again. After previous shambolic attempts to record my battles weeks after the event this time I made the effort to write the report soon after, which really helps. As he'd ousted me from my own Moria hex tile I was keen to recapture the caves and reclaim my 're-roll for climb/leap/jump'. That said two of my sergeants are injured so I was facing his Rohirrim with over 100pts less of my full warband. The points deficit between our warbands gave me 3 re-rolls and 3 extra influence points at the end of the game. We rolled Chance Encounter again - objectives is 'the leaders of both companies are looking for a quick victory, without taking too many casualties', however, the victory conditions are to reduce your opponent to 25% of it's starting models.

Luckily I got to deploy first and as I looked at my numerical disadvantage and the 6 heavy cavalry I was facing I was at a loss as to how I might overcome the odds stacked against me. I did the only thing I could and try to use the terrain to my advantage - setting up on the hill, with my faster Warg and Cave Troll on the far right flank, able to move through the trees without penalty because I hold Lothlorien. 

Otty won priority and sent his cavalry surging forward to 'the hill I was prepared to die upon'! Infantry, including a roaming spirit of the dead, a warrior and his hound went to come round the trees, while a small rearguard with the archers held back a bit. In response I drew further out of charge range on top of the hill - trying to create a choke point to face as few cavalry as possible. My Wargs headed through the trees and the Troll skirted the bottom of the hill behind the trees. 

Otty was able to snipe one of my Wargs with an archer - so much for roving ahead under the cover of the trees. I was beginning to doubt every tactical decision I was making. Having withdrawn my Goblins further along the hill I realise it was perhaps another mistake. It delayed Otty's cavalry charge for another turn, with another round of him using his throwing spears. Luckily, I think no one died in the delay but he made the charge with just 2 horse warriors. 2 remained on the hill as back up, while the last two fell back to support against the troll.

My Troll charged the ghostly Warrior of the dead, with a 12 on the Terror test. His rage managed to overcome it's incorporeal nature and he hurled it through the Warrior, hound and the cavalry. The hound and cavalry perished while the rest were knocked flat. My lone Warg had skirted the back of Otty's deployment zone, avoided a round of shooting and pounced on his rearguard archer, but cavalry was on the way and the Warg couldn't press its advantage. I snuck my Goblin Prowler past the main cavalry melee on top of the hill to tie up the secondary cavalry, somehow he survived. 2 more Rohirrim infantry broke through the trees to come up the back of the hill.

The Troll remained locked with the ghost but killed the warrior. My Prowler also kept two cavalry tied up and one of Goblin spears took down one of the horsemen, despite being attacked from behind by the two foot soldiers.

Otty managed to trap my Warg, but the dice gods were not with him! 🎲🎲🎲🎲

The combat on the hill just couldn't be broken. My Prowler continued to be a thorn in the cavalry's side. If I won the duel I failed to wound, if I lost the duel I somehow survived. This allowed my troll to finally kill the Ghost, he failed his Terror charge, but the host didn't fail its and paid the price for it's undead hubris. The Troll surged up the hill to try to break the deadlock.

One Rohirrim left the fight on the hill, his colleague  surged into the back of my lines but not far enough away to escape the Troll. I was losing Goblins and the fights were becoming more even numbered now.

Despite this I was lucky winning some duels but then my luck evaporated and I couldn't convert that opportunity into victory. 🎲🎲🎲

We were both losing the odd model here and there - Otty had the advantage on priority to cavalry charge but I just had numerical advantage to trap him, plus the Troll was unwounded and my Blackshields were as durable as Otty's Rohirrim. I used my last might point to move first, despite losing priority but prevent another cavalry charge. 

Despite the advantage I couldn't capitalise again, that last might point would have won me the duel against the green knight. Meanwhile the red knight threw all his attack on my Blackshield and suddenly those 1s became 6s. For a moment Otty thought he'd made a mistake not attacking the Troll, but he got double strikes on the Goblin, so wouldn't have had the dice to take out the Troll.

We were both approaching our 25% and Otty was struggling with his break rolls. He'd had a good round where only 1 Warrior fled out 5 or 6, but I think he lost 2 here and I may have lost 1. He may have reached 25% first but I followed shortly after but forgot to remove Mang [my little drummer boy] so it looked like I had 4 left and was in 33% and had won!

Of course I hadn't, it was a draw and I discovered hitting that Win button early on https://battle-companies-manager.com/ can be quite the inconvenience. I'm wasn't about to hit the 'back' button to try to fix the result and risk losing all the stats. I'd some how wrestled what I thought was inevitable defeat into almost victory! Luckily I could edit the extra experience and influence after the fact. I was really lucky with injuries though - Zit my leader was completely healed, including his leg wound! And, with +1 to my injury rolls, because I hold the Shire, I got two 'wounds of a hero' for an extra 8 Influence points. I ended the game with 22, enough to get me a second Troll. Nobody died, nobody missed a game and I have 6 Influence left to try to add a couple more Goblins and I got some heavy armour for my Leader.

This was an epic game, fun, tactical and although I still haven't recovered Moria I am absolutely ready to roll through everyone now, and reclaim what's mine!

Terrain is everything - Munitorum containers - TO DONE! [Red & white pics]

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been #PaintingWarhammer and somehow after finishing the Plague Marines with 2 days left of the 2021/22 Hobby Season I decided to finish this red and cream Munitorum Container off. 

It was far from planned but I only needed to do the control panel and varnish so there wasn't really much to do.

And anything to avoid those Ravenwing, right?!

What is annoying is I've since discovered I didn't do a proper TO DONE! for the yellow/black container. I think I treated it as a Minor project and was going to give myself a Major badge when all 3 were completed.

So these pics are the only red TO DONE pics I've taken of it and really they're to showcase the red/cream container.

Still, they both look cool.

And I may as well do the white pics too.

The big number is my favourite bit.

So, definitely here's the last Great Big BLESSED VERDIGRIS Stamp of Approval for the 2021/22 Hobby Season! Now, I've the last of the three containers to do, or have I?