7/01/2022

The battle of the High Vale Plains

After resting and bringing reinforcements, Einar is ready to come out and fight the Orcs of Naz-Goth again. So when news arrived of a new Orc army heading his capital, he rushed to face them at the right place. He wanted them in the plains of High Vale so he could use his new cavalry, and as the Orcs were happy with that, the battle was joined.

I deployed Einar's army first with him and his unit of Huscarls in the centre, and archers and cavalry on both flanks. Then I rolled to see which kind of deployment the Orcs were going to do. They got "Hammer and Anvil - One wing is oversize while the other is weak. Advance the center and one oversized wing to a crush the enemy force between the two. The other wing is lightly held and used to protect the center from being encircled." So on the Orc's right flank (deployed at the top) they had a unit of Black Moon Orcs Rep 5 AC 4 with the general in it plus all their cavalry except one unit of archers held in reserve. Then they have a mass of Orcs Rep 4, AC 3 and finally on their left flank a big unit of Goblins from Zog-Rot who joined the Orcs for the spoils.  

Turn 1. Einar 4 - Orcs 5. Only the right wing of Orcs activated and advanced. Then, Einar's army moved forward in one block, except a cavalry unit on the left who charged down from the hill, hitting into a unit of Orc's cavalry.

Einar's knights clashing against Orc riders.

Turn 2. Einar 3 - Orcs 6. The Orcs froze and Einar took the initiative. The cavalry on the left side charged to Goblin archers and although they shoot at them, they didn't hit any and were massacred in the ensuing melee.

On the right wing the cavalry was still engaged but the archer on the hill shot the other unit and killed one rider. Then the Fyrd charged the Orcs but they were bounced by the Orc general and his unit of Black Moon Orcs.

 Turn 3. Einar 6 - Orcs 2. The Orcs finally reacted and the Black ones exterminated one Fyrd unit.

But in the centre things weren't so good with one unit of Orcs just leaving the fight...

...and then the enemy's cavalry on the left finishing all the Goblin archers.

Turn 4. Einar 2 - Orcs 2. Confusion! Doubles in activation means you roll again the play next turn with your army moving as per NPC tables.

Turn 5. Einar 2 - Orcs 1. Einar's army moved first but according to the NPC charts. Luckily, they all moved correctly and did the right thing. The Fyrd on their right flanked the Orcs and the cavalry charged their rear and thus, all the Orcs in the centre were eliminated.

The only survivors were half of the Black Moon Orcs with his general and a few riders. They fled together with the other cavalry unit that was held in reserve and never arrived. It was a total victory to Einar and now he would be marching directly into Orc territory!


8 comments:

  1. Very interesting write-up. Two quick questions, please:

    1) You refer to rolling for a deployment type (resulting in "hammer and anvil"). I don't see that in my copy of WHAT. Where is that from?

    2) In turn 4, you rolled doubles for activation, which resulted in your band acting as NPCs. Where is that rule from? I don't see it in my copy of WHAT.

    Thank you!

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    1. My bad, sorry. I've started to rework the old Fantasy Warrior Heroes Warbands rulebook from the newer and historic version Great Hall Burning, so Eilif's WHAT adventurers has drifted to Einar's ones, with battles instead of skirmishes, and I forgot to mention it.
      1)The rolling for deployment thing is taken from the OOP ruleset now being sold by Rebel Minis, Rally Round the King, which was to play even bigger battles.
      2) The rolling thing of doubles in activation is from my own. As I'm rewriting Warrior Heroes Warbands, I'm also including some stuff of my own.
      So the last batreps you can read from my blog are basically testing the new Warrior Heroes Warbands that I called tentatively Warrior Heroes Battles. Sorry for the confusion.
      Cheers,

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    2. Fantastic. Thanks for the explanation. It's fun and inspiring to see how you tweak the rules! Have fun with your game and best wishes for the rules rewrite!

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  2. Great write up. It really feels like you are playing out an epic saga! Good to see the cavalry get to g it's outing as well. Your rule additiins sound interesting and added to the narrative. I always liked the old Fantasy Warriors rules for that reason, but I may also have to borrow some of your concepts, especially rolling g for deployment.

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    1. Thanks Alan. The rolling for deployment is a great concept written in Rally Round the Kind by Ed from THW that works really well to determine enemy's deployment when playing solo.

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  3. A very exciting battle, which for once did not turn into a generalized massacre, but into a clear victory for men!
    Poor goblins, it did not go very well ... Do you think you will keep a sort of "memory" of the successes / failures in the next battles? We mean that realistically the goblins will think twice before taking the field again against King Einar; or will they be inflamed with the unlikely desire to avenge their archers?

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    1. Well, there will be something about that definitely in the rules but right now I'm just playing to test fighting. So far I've tested infantry, archery and cavalry and a bit of magic, and next will be bigger creatures such as Trolls or even Giants and more magic, so there will be another big army of Orcs with Trolls this time defending from Einar retaliating. This is also a way I use to motivate me to paint minis but the problem with that is I don't play and test until I got the minis painted so it takes time. Right now I'm painting Trolls. ;-)

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