Hobbit SBG - Dwarves and Elves vs Orcs

"The Dwarf-scum, Master... we lost them. Ambushed by Elvish filth, we were..."          

Yazneg the Orc, An Unexpected Journey, The Hobbit

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