A Couple more games

 Last Saturday I took my ogres for a spin, back to back games. First vs Josh's goblins then a second vs Gordon's undead. 

I've tried a new way of doing my gaming reports. 

And Game two: Vs Gordon's undead. 

Craig 

KoW: Ogres vs Undead

 i had another game vs Gordon's undead on Monday. He's tweaked his list slightly, dropping the very effective balefire catapults for some cavalry. 

I too have been tweaking my list, this time trying out a troop of boomer chariots and a regiment of regular chariots and also adding back in the shooters for some board conttrol (a suggestion of Gordon's. 

We rolled up Control, which means you get points at the end of the game for the number of table quadrants your control, with a small army like mine this could be a challenge. 

Gordon won the dice roll to see who went first and decided to  take the first turn. 

I decided to try to defend 2/3rds of the table- thanks to Godon ponting out I always try to deploy central and defend both flanks. This time the aim was to secure one flank and push though the centre. I decided to avoid the wood on the right, manly as I knew the werewolves would race round the tower and flank me, and htat was one of my main aims to try to deal with the superfast flanking force that is the werewolves. 

The skeletons assemble. Not the greatest troops in the game but they have proved to be quite good at holding up and allowing other troops to get flank attacks. 

Turn 1 the undead shuffle forward in an almost continous line. 

The ghouls take the high ground. 

On my turn I pivot towards the threat on my right flank. As I suspected the werewolves race round the tower. 

Turn 2 the undead continue their advance. Gordon amde a mistake here in that the horde of skeletons behnd te hill proved to be in my side arc and allowed me to focus fire and wipe them out. 

In my turn the boomer chariot troop and a regiment of boomers advance onto the hill to get line of sight on the skelton horde.

Another shot. 

The skeletons are no more. 

Gordon responds swiftly, surging skeletons into the boomer chariots

The boomer chariots are destroyed but the boomer regiment holds. The shooters and nom Nom turn to face the werewolf threat. 

In the distance Manny takes on the ghouls. 

skeleton hordes surge into the warrior chariots. 

The game has see-sawed back and forward and still lies in the balance. Both siege breakers ahve been forced the turn and face the werewolf menace- 480 pts vs 200 odd is not efficient use of points!

However we are running out of turns so one siege breakers turns back to try and get across the table.

The charitos ahve proved quite resilient, well until the zombie trolls join the fray. 

Gordon is massing too much unit strigngth in my central area. 

Manny has dealt with the ghouls and the ghoul ghast has also been seen off. 

I am outnumbered. 

Gordon's turn 6. Finally the werewolves are committed, aided by Lykanis and a regiment of skeletons...

The siege breakers are destroyed. 

On my turn 6 I avoid combat and claim 4 table sections vs 2, and then roll and there is no turn 7 so sneak a win in really close entertaining game. If there was a turn 7 I was screwed though!

I really enjoyed this one we both had our chances and it went right down to the wire. 

Good game Gordon

Craig 

Game 2 vs Goblins

 Josh has been running his goblins for quite a while now, slowly whipping them into shape. He's had a few losses (haven't we all) but is becoming very proficient with his army. We've only managed a couple of game so far and was keen to see howthe ogres would fare vs his goblin hordes with their annoying chaff regiments. 

Reinforcements- more chariots

I decided to mix things up with terrain and see what differneve a river would make. 

The mission was Salt the Earth. I protected my right flank with my boomer charitos and aimed to take the objectves on the left. josh must have had similar ideas as his goblins mass vs my left.

Josh doesn't muck around putting pressure on my left flank with mawpups and the winggit. The winggit is my favourite mantic model. 

A better view. on the right the warrior regiment is engaged by goblin rabble while jst to the left of them the troll bruier and the beserker brave exchange cooking tips. Who said beserkers and brusiers don't have a sensitive side?

The siege breakers and ogre warrior chariots punch though whatever was in frnt of them. Patton once said something aoubt ig noring flanks, so we did. The banggit didn't seem to mind. I hoped to punch clear through the lines but it wasn't too be. 

Fighting continues on the right and Manny is running amok ably supported by a regiment of boomers. 

By ignoring the mawpups on the flank i've given them free reign to do as they please- which usually involves eating ogres.

Things are looking up on the right flank. 

Release the hounds...er pups. Mincer mob in the front, pups in the side. The siege breakers are in trouble as are the chariots being flansk charged by trolls. 

Manny to the rescue?

Not if Josh has anything to say aobut it- the ogres  apprear isolated, surrounded and running  out of options. 

Manny combines with the boomes vs the mincer mob.

the chariots hang on vs the trolls, Manny and boomers chip away but the mawpups and goblin blasters are about to destory my final unit of siege breakers. 

Now you see them...

And now you don't. 

the goblins take it 4-1. 

A really good game and I took lots away from it. As I had always suspected, don't send your heavy hitters in to get bogged by chaffy rabble units and so leaving them exposed to charges by nastry trolls etc.. the exploding trolls unit sucks as do blasters. Which reminds me, concetrate your shooting vs threats such as these. I was guilty of a pepper pot approiach this game and probably spread myslef too wide and so disapated my firepower. 

Finally, to hell with patton. This game is all aobut flanlks, so protect the bloody things. Seriously though, Josh played well, he uses his chaff units really well and combined units nicely to overwhelm my toughrer untis.

Josh played well and was the deserved winner.

Now I'm off to plot the goblins downfall...

Craig

2022 Game 1: Orges vs Undead

 Having been riding high on victories of late the ogres have been brought crashing back to earth. 

My ogres have had a couple of games in the past week vs Gordon (undead) and Josh (Goblins). I am continuing to experiment with a few units but the core remains the same for the ogres

2x boomer regiments- I love the flexibility

2x siege breakers

1x warrior regiment- which have proved very resilient and hard hitting for their size.

Manny the Mammoth (aka the brains of the outfit)

Nom Nom

A berserker bully

A boomer sergeant or two. 

I added a regiment of allied gore riders vs Gordon but they became balefire catapult bait.

Gordon made a list he is wanting to use in a future Oamaru Onslaught/Muster if there is an odd number of players to play the bye and was trying to make something pretty simple for new players to face but as it turned out having both faced it Josh and I think it is pretty damn good. I now have an immense amount of respect for Balefire catapults! 

The mission was dominate. 

Deployment. I thought I'd hidden the gore riders from the catapults but forgot the gore riders were height 3 and Gordon's skeletons only height 2 so I wasn't hidden after all. Doh!

The Gore riders redeploy while on the far flanks werewolves are already causing issues with threatening to flank my forces...

In the centre the warrior regiment holds vs the ghoul hordes and werewolves. 

A sacrifical boomer sergeant tries to slow the weewolves advance. 

My lines are still intact but thse bloody catapults are being a pin.

Gordon uses a character to stop the seige breakers attacking the werewolves. 

Gore riders to the rescue?

The orc Krudger making an end run for the catapults. In the centre the boomer chariots and seige breakers charge the ghouls. 

The seige breakers make short work of the werewolf character but on my left I am getting bogged down with skeletons. 

Not ideal, having worked theri way into the rear of the ogre lines the werewolves charge the rear of the seige breakers, ouch!

Meanwhile Manny and the boomes are bogged down

And now the trolls charge though...

It ended up a massacre after the werewolves turned the flanks. Gordon really got his units working well together and I paid the price for letting the werewolves get round the flanks. up to that point I was happy with the battle in the centre but from the end of turn 4 the game turned into a rout. 

The gore riders succumbed to the new unit curse and were eviscerated long before they could influence the battle. i like the idea of Gore rider allies but may wait till we play larger point games. We will see. 

Very well played Gordon. That is a very interesting list and the combinations synergised well together.

Craig