Swan Knights of Dol Amroth

 Assembling the forces for our attempt at Gondorian Infamy last weekend, I found that the Roman Auxiliary Cavalry list called for two groups of 6 cavalry, but my Middle-earth collection only had 5 knights of Gondor, plus Aragorn and Boromir on horses.  As a quick solution, 6 light horse will conscripted from my El Cid-era Spanish force.  However, pride dictated that I needed another 6 horsemen specific to Middle-earth's kingdoms of Men.  

Arthur and I took a trip to Imperial Hobbies, where we found they had knights of Gondor in stock, CAD$55 for 6.  However, they also had Fireforge mounted sergeants, CAD$44 for 12. Parsimoniousness beat out brand loyalty, and I quickly assembled 6 caparisoned horses along with suitable riders.  I didn't really like the head options that came with the sergeants, so I found a few replacements in the Russian foot box.  Then I slapped on a quick paint job to set these riders up as the famous Swan Knights of Dol Amroth, who were among the soldiers mustered to protect Minas Tirith during the War of the Ring.

 

Infamy, Infamy in Gondor - village raid

 A couple of weeks ago, Doug and I had a chat about different types of rules, specifically rules where players need to learn specifics about how the rules work in order to get the most of them, as opposed to rules that are more intuitive.  These intuitive rules can be overly simple, and as a result they can sometimes be less effective at representing finer details. Inspired by this conversation, I pulled out Infamy, Infamy from Too Fat Lardies.

TFL's idea in writing I,I was not to present rules for big battles, but instead to recreate the challenges of a Roman centurion or barbarian chieftain in detail, with decisions about when to hurl pila, or how best to inspire the warriors to charge.  To mix things up a bit, I decided to change the setting from the frontier of the Roman empire to Middle-earth, and represent soldiers of Gondor moving to challenge an orc raid into their territory.

Arthur and I went through the pregame setup from the I,I rulebook.  We chose a village raid by the orcs, set somewhere in 'civilised territory'.  The random terrain generation process gave a few hills in quadrants 6 and 3 plus a smaller hill in quadrant 1, a marsh in 3, a big forest across 4 and 5, and a small settlement in quadrant 4.

The Gondorian forces used the Roman Cohors Equitata list, with two groups of cavalry led by a Status II leader (Boromir)

Plus three groups of foot soldiers led by Status III Boromir, supported by Status II Faramir, and a group of archers with a supernumary leader.

The orcs used the standard German barbarian list, with a level III warlord with supporting Level II leader commanding 10 elite warriors and 20 regular warriors, plus a level II chieftain with 20 warriors, plus a group of archers.

The two main warbands moved into the open ground.

The cavalry and archers went for a flanking move through the settlement and around the forest.

The main Gondorian force formed up in close order.

Cavalry continued their flanking move.

We had a back and forth battle between the two main forces, lots of effort for the orcs to build up fervour and spend signa cards on aggressive attack, while the Gondorians used their signa cards to hurl javelins and brace shields.  There's lots of stuff to keep track of, and the number of available attack dice (and defence dice too) must be recalculated each turn as fervour drops, conditions like 'braced' and aggressive are removed, shock and casualties come into play.   Unfortunately, no matter how many factors are considered, it still ends up being a buckets of dice resolution, and a slow one due to the need to revise the dice count each time.

Anyway, here is a shot of the cavalry lining up a charge against the secondary German force.

The main battle gradually petered out, with Boromir and Faramir still alive (Sean Bean's character going against type and surviving the battle, however!).  Buckets of dice visible in the middle of the table, though! 

Meanwhile, the cavalry got beat up by the second German force.  It was at this time we decided to call it.  Gondorian morale was down to three, the forces were badly reduced, and while they could have inflicted some more harm on the orcs, a Gondor victory was probably going to be out of reach.

We had a quick after-game discussion.  Arthur, Craig and Doug were all in agreement that the game is not very satisfying, so I don't think I will convince them to try again.  At least the lembas bread was popular.

Dragon Rampant - Gondor vs Mordor

I am a proud papa! Last week at Bonsor, Arthur hosted a game:  He set up the scenario, and then refereed the game.  The scenario had a small force of Gondor spearmen and archers stranded in some ancient ruins, where they needed to defend themselves against a force of Mordor orcs led by the Nazgul.  Meanwhile, a relief force hurried to their rescue!

Arthur setting up the table

Initial disposition of the troops:  defenders in the ruins, and the orcs preparing to assault.

First moves:  a group of orcs advances to the ruins.  Unfortunately, the orcs failed their second activation, resulting in an end to their turn.  This was a recurring challenge for the orcs!

Arrival of the reinforcements.  They arrived by boat. The group of dwarves jumped onto the shore with ease, but Arthur determined that the cavalry would need a bit more time to get their horses ashore.

Meanwhile, the defenders of the ruins easily hold off the orc attackers.  It's almost as if they don't need to be reinforced!

The fighting Uruk-hai attack the dwarves!  The first skirmish sees the dwarves pushed back.  But then a disastrous attempt to rally (snake eyes) sees the dwarves scattered and depart the game!

Meanwhile, the defenders in the ruins are doing just fine; the orc attackers cannot get a foothold inside the ruined castle.

Boromir leads the Gondorian cavalry against the Nazgul, but is pushed back.

Instead, he turns his attention to the Uruk-hai and disperses them.

Finally, with all the orcs destroyed or dispersed, the witch-king flees the field, pursued by the remaining Gondorian horse!

The game went well.  Michael and Evan shared command of the forces of Gondor, both playing their first game of Dragon Rampant.  I lead the forces of Mordor to a predictable defeat.  I didn't take advantage of the Nazgul's special ability to cause fear - I should have had them support the orcs attacking the castle - they could cause fear on the defenders, then send in the orcs to easily defeat the defenders.  Instead, I used them to slow down the reinforcements - all too typical for me, I'm afraid, as I am far too prone to dividing my forces instead of concentrating them for victory.

Congrats to Arthur for successfully running a game at the club, and thanks to Michael and Evan for joining us for the game!

Characters - Movember 2023, Wild Bill Hickock and the Witch King

I finished up a handful of characters.

Here is this year's Movember figure from Pulp Figures.  Bob really outdid himself this year!  I decided to base the uniform on the 25th Lancers Frontier Force.  No special reason for the choice, I just liked the green coat :)

Next up is Brigade Game's version of Wild Bill Hickock, inspired by Keith Carradine's version of the character from the fantastic HBO Deadwood series.

And thirdly, a version of the leader of the Nazgul, the Witch King of Angmar, complete with flaming sword.  The rider is from the Nazgul on Fell Beast kit that I assembled a while back, on a GW Rohan horse.

And here is the full selection of ersatz Nazgul!  5 foot and 4 mounted.  Enough for now!

More ersatz Nazgûl

 In preparation for when the Quest of the Ringbearer reaches Amon Sûl (aka Weathertop), I assembled a few more of my ersatz Nazgûl.  This time I used some Frostgrave plastic wizards as a base.  Even though these are the female wizards, once they are not going to be recognizable once they are covered in their cloaks.  And who is to say that all these ancient lords of men who were seduced by Sauron's rings were all really men - maybe the Nazgûl actually included some women in their numbers as well!

So here are the base figures.  The three on the left are the future ringwraiths; the fourth will be a future barrow wight, and the last was just for fun because I wanted to use the head with the witch's hat.

Here are the Nazgûl with their cloaks.

And here they are with some paint!

Here are all the Nazgûl so far.

Buckleberry Ferry

 Arthur and I continued following the Quest of the Ringbearer, as Frodo and company flee toward the Buckleberry Ferry.  This scenario is similar to the Short Cuts... scenario, with three ringwraiths starting the game as sentries, and the hobbits trying to cross the table to the escape point.  This scenario increases the challenge level for the hobbits in several ways:  the ringwraiths are not impaired by the daylight, so the hobbits no longer benefit from the stalk unseen rule, Frodo must reach the ferry in particular, and not just any point on the east side of the board, and most importantly, Gildor Inglorion, 70-point elf hero of fortitude and nemesis of the ringwraiths, has been replaced by Merry, 10-point minor hero.

Here is the ferry, the goal for the hobbits.  Dock is from the Laketown House kit!

The hobbits enter, staying together, as the ringwraiths cast about searching for the ringbearer.

As the ringwraiths slowly search toward the hobbits, they swing right to try to avoid the searchers.

A ringwraith finally gets close enough, the alarm is raised and no more sentries rule for the evil side!

And so the Nazgul attempt to pile on to Frodo, while his friends try to run interference.  Hobbits must pass a courage test to charge the Nazgul, with a -1 penalty due to their Harbinger of Evil aura - as a general rule, this means Sam almost always is successful, while Merry and Pippin are more hit or miss.

Merry gets taken out, but Sam and Pippin keep doing their best to distract the Nazgul while Frodo makes for the ferry.

The hobbits make good use of their wounds and fate rolls, plus a great amount of luck, and outlast two of the ringwraiths.  Each time they enter combat, they lose a point of will, so eventually they lose their last point and their corporeal presence dissolves.  Actually, this only happened to one of the Nazgul, as Sam, after many unsuccessful attempts, finally managed to wound the other and (temporarily) banished him from the mortal realm!

With two of the Nazgul gone, it's now a race between Frodo and the remaining ringwraith!

Frodo reaches the ferry with the Nazgul hot on his tail!  It all comes down to a single die roll:  who will win priority for the next turn?

Priority goes to the forces of Good!  Frodo launches the ferry, and even though it only travels 1", that is enough as the Nazgul cannot enter the water.  Victory to the ringbearer, by the narrowest of margins!