Friday 15 November 2013

Hobbit SBG - Khazad Army vs Mordor

The Hobbit SBG Logo
"Come not between the Nazgul and his prey! 
Or he will not slay thee in thy turn. .."          
The Witch King, Return of the King, The Lord of the Rings


The Hobbit SBG Rule Book
The Hobbit Strategy Battle Game Rule Book
This latest battle saw a surprise visit to the club from Bilbo (onering).  Sam was fielding a 1000 point Mordor army including the Witch King on fell beast, black guard and loads of Morannon orcs - as he was on his own Bilbo joined in and took 1/2 the force.


I took Gimli with 12 Khazad guard, the Kings champion flanked by vault wardens and teamed up with Craig who had Floi and 12 rangers as well as a dwarf king and some more Khazad guard.
We rolled for hold the hill and then went about rolling for deployment...
The Armies, both circa 1000 points would be hard to pick a winner and it turned out to be a very close battle...

...Check out the pictures below to see who wins!


The battlefield, with the hill on the left and two ruins in the middle 

Sam's Black Guard supported by Morannon Orcs

The Witch King on Fell beast with more Morannon and some spiders too!

My Army - Gimli and 12 Khazad Guard

The Kings Champion and 5 Vault Warden teams

Craig's part of the army - Flio with Dwarf Rangers

Dwarf king 1 and Khazad Guard

Dwarf King 2 and Khazad Guard

Once deployed Flio looks out of the ruins onto the hill -
I tried to persuade Craig to run them in to the fray to get into range
and start pinning down the fell beast...
but Craig wants to hold the ruins

As usual with The Hobbit SBG we ended up shield wall to shield wall...

The witch King leads from the rear...

Sam fills the ruins with his Blackguard and Morannon

Round 1 - and straight away the clash of the shield lines pushes dwarf and orc together

Bilbo who has the right side orcs charges into Craigs Khazad

Craig, gets ready to move the rangers... yes, come on!!

BUT... moves them into the ruins... erm,
he is really worried about the orcs and nasty fell beast!

however he uses his Khazad to good effect to swamp the Morannon

The battle from above

Gimli leads the charge against two orcs and quickly surround them

Craig is victorious on the right and the orcs are looking vulnerable there

Meanwhile in the centre is seems to be a stale mate!

Khazad! Cries Gimli as he clears the flank

Winning priority the dwarves charge in...

...and start surrounding the orcs, fin the flanks... win the fight!

The centre again sees the clash of steel

Shagrat leaves the ruins and takes on the dwarves

Meanwhile Sam pushes forward on the left to hold of Gimli

Things are looking good, Gimli and the dwarves seem to be winning the left flank too!

The right flank falls and the dwarves now control that area,
time to move on to the hill and attack the rear of their shield wall

The dwares in the centre are also gaining the upper hand, having successfully s
topped an immobilise spell from the Witch king

Charge! The Kings Champion again tries to push forward and tries
to get rid of the Black Guard captain

Morannon banner arrives to add some extra rolls to the orcs

Craig's Khazad protecting my vault flank is pushed away and starts to take causalities!

Gimli prepares for the next wave of orcs heads to cut of with his axe!

Another round and Mordor seem to keep winning priority,
this allows them to push more warriors in the side of the vault wardens
and even manage to get a spider to the rear of the kings champion!

What was looking like certain victory is now looking less certain
as floods of Black guard leave the ruins and head for the Vault warden flank... 

I was so in to the battle that I forgot to take some photos...
But, Sam flew his fell beast at Gimli, cast immobilise, which i failed to save,
then charged him, I called heroic strike, but rolled a 1!
(from 1/2 through the battle my dice rolling became horrendous)
We rolled for combat, Sam rolled 6 and I rolled 2, he then put 6 hits on me and killed Gimli, my general...

Next he went for the Kings Champion but with all the Khazad gaurd attacking his rear and Craig calling heroic march to get Floi and his rangers onto the hill, it was just too late and time ran out

The battle ended, it had started off looking like it would be a white wash for Durin's folk, then the Witch king annialated Gimli and his entire warband of Khazad guard, but in the end it was very close and....

...the final score was
Durins Folk 35 vs 32 Mordor




Final thoughts:
I think Craig and I were lucky to escape here, there just wasn't time for another round and who would have won, i really couldn't tell.  The dwarves still had the numbers, but the witch king was poised to strike again.  Again, I won by keeping in mind the objective and getting Craig to heroic march just in time to get the rangers on the hill!

The Dwarves were tough, needing 6's and even 6/4 in the centre, to kill... but the Black Guard and Morannon, being fairly tough and plenty of them managed to hold out long enough for the Witch King to start to pull it back.

Again this was a game that turned in to a shield wall vs shield wall, Craig didn't shoot anything and effectively wasted the points, but saved the day just int he nick of time.

Bilbo and Sam could have won this battle, if Sam had moved the Witch King in sooner, but then there were a lot of auto courage passing Khazad to contend with.

It was a good, hard fought match. The final score was Durins Folk 35 - 32 Mordor and another close victory for me!

Man of the match:
Man of the Match: The Witch King on Fell Beast
This weeks Man of the Match has to go to The Witch King, he slaughtered Gimli and kept us using fate to save vs his magic, he was a pain... albeit an expensive one! He turned the tide for Mordor, but just took too long to get intot he battle.

The King Champion, was a close second, again he was solid and held his own.

Close win this time for the Dwarves! .




  

We welcome anyone interested in playing The Hobbit SBG, Lotr SBG, WotR or any warhammer/40K battle - why not let us know so that we can arrange some starter battles, like the one above, or if you/your club want to challenge us. We have all the LOTR/Hobbit SBG figures and LOTR scenery from the Mines of Moria to the siege of Helms Deep, snow fields to desert boards ready and waiting.  



Why not join our watch list for updates and look out for Easters weekend battle event... two days of fighting in the ruins of Osgiliath, Helms Deep and Far Harad, you cannot afford to miss it.

Feel free to email us to come along or arrange a game.


East Grinstead War Gaming club 
Sussex
At East Grinstead War Gamers we often play Hobbit/LOTR SBG - both skirmish battles and walk through the books/films each Monday night and WotR on club nights.

Friday 8 November 2013

Hobbit SBG - Dwarves and Elves vs Orcs

The Hobbit SBG Logo

"The Dwarf-scum, Master... we lost them. Ambushed by Elvish filth, we were..."          
Yazneg the Orc, An Unexpected Journey, The Hobbit


The Hobbit SBG Rule Book
The Hobbit Strategy Battle Game Rule Book
This is the latest battle report from East Grinstead Wargamers, sorry it has taken a while to post... this was from a couple of weeks ago.  

Craig and Sam lead a force of High Elves including Glorfindel, the twins and lots of Elves. Sam took his imfamous Erebor Dwarves with Thorin, Dwalin and Young Balin to fight against my Morrannon army led by Gothmog, the Knight of Umber and load of Orcs. 

The Armies are both circa 1000 points and was a very close battle...

..,Check out the pictures below to see who wins!
The Hobbit SBG Battlefied (objectives with gold coins under)

Craig's High Elf Army deployed

Sam's Erebor Dwarf Army Deploys

My Morannon Army laid out ready to deploy

Arial view of Mordor Morannon Army

Morannon Shaman deploys in ruins, my aim to tie up and out flank those filthy Elven archers

New deployment = shield wall to shield wall... Dwalin vs Gothmog, Sam smiles at that

Knight of Umbar and Trollface Thorin Oakenshield, I know Sam likes this match up!

The rest of my Morannon scatter through the woods, the objective has lots more elves in the way

Battle lines are drawn

Good win priority and immediately charge Dwalin into gothmog,
Gothmog and Dwalin fight it out, luckily Gothmog rolls 6 and wins the fight

Dwalin receives too many wounds and is killed 

Morannon and dwarves seem to have a stale mate and struggle to kill each other!

Next Thorin Oakenshield calls heroics to boost his fight value
above the Knight of Umbar - who gets to mimic the base value of Thoin, and charges in

Meanwhile, the elves and morannon engage in the ruins

Fighting  is intense....

The troll takes a bashing and takes wounds, but manages to hold and push back with some spear support

The Elves charge the Morannon orcs and leave the objective,
a real battle in the trees

The Elves leave the Morannon with a bloody nose, but they  hang on in there

Glorfindel in Armour vs Morannon captain... Im never gonna win this one!

Thorin having successfully beaten the Knight of Umbar, gets swammed by orcs
to allow the wraith to withdraw (not run away)

The elven twin in armour charges to get to Gothmog, but an orc is in the way

THe High Elves get the better of my morannon in the ruins

More dead Morannon 

The Morannon are holding in the centre and win a few key battles...

The Mordor troll clears the dwarves by playing skittles

Safety in numbers - the Morannon try to flood and swam the Elves

The knight of Umber uses magic on Thorin to keep him in control

The Mordor Troll does it again and starts to give the Morannon a good advantage
over the Erebor Dwarves

Gothmog fights the elven twin, but his brother is sneaking through the ruins
and looks like he will try to steal my objective

The centre is dwindling fast for both sides



More Morannon hold the flank and hold the ruins,
The Elven archers struggle to find a target

Stale mate and neither hero wins

After the last round, the dwarves finally seem to be getting the upper hand...
...must hold centre!

My left flank also looks wasted. This just doesn't look like it's going my way

I sneakily move some orcs into range of the Elven objective to contest it

One final blow and Gothmog manages to charge the sneaky Elven twin before he can make the objective and actually manages to kill him!!! The battle ends and now it's time to see who controlled the most objectives!?

Mordor 5 vs 4 Dwarves and Elves

Final thoughts:
I think I had a lucky escape here, there just wasn't time for another round and just how long I could have held I don't know.  I won simply by having control of more objectives than the others and by keeping my eye on the objective of the game (and not letting my forces just get pulled in to a shield wall contest).  

The Dwarves were tough, needing 6's to kill... but the Morannon, being fairly tough and plenty of them mangaged to hold out long enough.  The Elves on the other hand seem to just cut through me and I couldn't afford to fling more troops at them.  

My concern is that this game seems to be shield wall vs shield wall, the archer side ahs been killed off, which is a shame... just look at the battle of Agincourt when English longbow men, heavily outnumber by the heavy French cavalry still won the day - I couldn't see this happening in SBG even with boggy mud slowing them down!

Craig and Sam could have won this battle, (and would have given another round) if they had held their objective.

It was a good, hard fought match. The final score was Mordor 5 - 4 Erebor and Elves.

Man of the match:
Man of the Match: Gothmog
For me it was Gothmog, he killed both Dwalin and and Elven Twin and had plenty of might to face the other twin, he kept the Dwarves from getting close to him and kept his side of the battle field in favour of the dwarves.  

Glorfindel was also very ggod, but didn't have the chance to really turn the tide of this battle, taking on a Morannon Captain and lots of orcs - a killing machine no doubt, but luckily not where he was needed. 

Close win for Mordor! .



  
At East Grinstead War Gamers we often play Hobbit/LOTR SBG - both skirmish battles and walk through the books/films each Monday night and WotR on club nights.

We welcome anyone interested in playing The Hobbit SBG, Lotr SBG, WotR or any warhammer/40K battle - why not let us know so that we can arrange some starter battles, like the one above, or if you/your club want to challenge us. We have all the LOTR/Hobbit SBG figures and LOTR scenery from the Mines of Moria to the siege of Helms Deep, snow fields to desert boards ready and waiting.  

Why not join our watch list for updates and look out for Easters weekend battle event... two days of fighting in the ruins of Osgiliath, Helms Deep and Far Harad, you cannot afford to miss it.
Feel free to email us to come along or arrange a game.

East Grinstead War Gaming club 
Sussex