Original Air Date: May 8, 2011
Glenstorm and I meet semi-regularly now, but today's battle is one of two battles we played during one evening. Glenstorm wanted to try out his Rohan again, since he's toying around with different strategies. I responded by using my Uruk force, instead of my Goblins.
Defenders of the Westfold: 405 points
Eomer with horse, shield, and throwing spears - 95 points
3 Rohan Royal Guards with throwing spears - 36 points
8 Warriors of Rohan with shields - 56 points
6 Warriors of Rohan with shields and throwing spears - 54 points
4 Warriors of Rohan with bows - 28 points
1 Warrior of Rohan with banner - 31 points
Ally: Boromir of Gondor - 105 points
24 units, 4 bows + 7 throwing weapons, 2 heroes
The Fist of Isengard: 400 points
Uruk Captain with shield and heavy armor- 60 points
18 Uruk Warriors with shields - 72 points
16 Uruk Warriors with pikes
35 units, no bows, 1 hero
The scenario we will be playing is a Meeting Engagement game on a board that is 48" long by 48" wide. In this game, no terrain is placed within 9" of the center of the board edge, which happens to be most of this board. All units will begin in base contact with the board edge and will fight until one force is reduced to 25% of its original units. At the end of that turn, the game ends. A major victory is won for the side that is not reduced to 25% if it has at least one hero alive. A minor victory is awarded if no heroes survive in the victor's force, and a draw is awarded if both armies are brought to 25% of their initial size during the same turn.
We will each roll a dice and the winner will choose whether he wants to select his board edge or if he wants priority.
Turn 1: Crossing the Plain (Priority - Rohan)
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Both armies just move towards each other.
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Turn 2: The Barrage Begins (P - Rohan)
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Both armies continue to move towards each other. Rohan archers nail 1 Uruk with shield.
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Kill count: Rohan 1, Uruks 0.
Turn 3: The Valiant Rider (P - Uruks)
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The Uruks advance close to the ranks of the Rohan. We get our first combat phase this turn...bring it!
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Nothing interesting happened during the Shoot phase, but in the Fight phase, Eomer knocks over 2 Uruk-Hai during the Fight phase and kills one of them.
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Here's a look at the Uruk phalanx...magnificent, isn't it? :-P
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Kill count: Rohan 3, Uruks 0.
Turn 4: War Is Upon Us (P - Rohan)
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As the armies meet in battle, the battles are drawn up as shown. In the Fight phase, all 3 heroes call heroic combats. Boromir will resolve his first, then Eomer, then the Uruk captain.
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Boromir blows his horn and one of the Uruks he is fighting fails his courage test. Both he and his comrade are killed shortly thereafter. Boromir then breaks off some of the pike support from a nearby battle. Boromir pays 2 Might points to win against the 5 Uruks who were fighting him. He killed them soon after. In the other fights shown here (done after the heroic combats) , the Rohan units killed an Uruk with shield, while the Uruks killed a Rohan Royal Guard. In three of the five phalanx fights, the Uruks won and killed their opponents.
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Eomer wins his fight easily and engages the Uruk Captain (AHHH!!!). Eomer then beats the Captain during his heroic combat and knocks him to the ground. He succeeds in getting 2 wounds on the captain and one is saved by Fate. So...Captain is still alive! The Uruk near the Captain won his fight and killed his opponent and the other single Uruks (including the guy on the ground) won their fights by shielding.
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Kill count: Rohan 8, Uruks 5.
Turn 5: The Rage of War and Leaders of Men (P - Uruks)
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Boromir calls a heroic move with his fourth Might point, allowing most of the Rohan units to engage quickly. In the Fights that ensued, the five phalanx fights led to 1 death. Boromir then wins his fight by paying his last 2 might points. He then kills an Uruk with shield. In the other fights, the Warriors of rohan killed 1 other Uruk with shield.
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Kill count: Rohan 10, Uruks 6.
Turn 6: The Hand Emerges (P - Rohan)
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Everyone charged into each other. Boromir loses his fight and takes 2 of his 3 wounds...ouch. Eomer also loses his fight and is wounded, but the wound is saved by a Fate point. Since all the other heroes are losing their fights this round, the Uruk Captain decided to lose as well (was not wounded though). In the other fights, the Rohan kill an Uruk with shield, while the Uruks killed a Rohan archer.
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Kill count: Rohan 11, Uruks 7.
Turn 7: Chaos on the Field (P - Uruk-Hai!)
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The Uruks are swarming, but the men of Rohan are stout. In the Fight phase, the Uruk Captain kills his man and Eomer kills both of his. Boromir also killed his man. In the other fights, the Uruks kill an archer and 2 Royal guards.
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Kill count: Rohan 14, Uruks 11.
Turn 8: Isolated and Alone (P - Uruks)
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The Uruks engage everyone. In the Fight phase, Eomer loses and his horse is killed. In the other fights, the Uruks kill the banner bearer. The Rohan killed an Uruk pikeman.
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Kill count: Rohan 15, Uruks 12.
Turn 9: The Messy Melee (P - Rohan)
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Rohan consolidates its position. Boromir wins his fight, but doesn't kill anyone. Pity. Eomer kills his man though. The Uruks kill three Warriors of Rohan with shields and an archer, while the rohan kill a pikeman.
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Kill count: Rohan 18, Uruks 17. The Uruks need to kill 1 more Rohan unit, while the Rohan need to kill 11.
Turn 10: The Final Doom (P - Uruks)
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During this final round, the Uruks took down 2 Warriors of Rohan with shields and 2 with spears. They also took down Boromir. In the next picture, you can see the one poor unit who sealed the loss for the Rohan...
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Game over, victory Uruk-Hai.
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Conclusion:
Assessment by Glenstorm:
I was much closer to breaking his force in this game than in past games. Killing 17 of his 35 Uruk-Hai means that I had killed almost 50% of his force, which is not a bad showing for Rohan. His men had more armor, strength, and fight value than mine, and he rolled a lot of sixes. The new strategy of using less throwing weapons and integrating Boromir seemed pretty effective, though perhaps a substantially larger force would work better. In any event, I was very pleased with my warriors' performance, even though we lost.
Assessment by Tiberius:
The high Defense and Fight values of the Uruk-Hai have preserved them again. During this Meeting Engagement, we didn't play with fleeing troops once half of the force was killed. If we had, it is quite likely that many of my Uruks would have fled...particularly since I have one hero who isn't guaranteed to pass his own courage test. Still, good game...I had lots of fun.
Stellar unit for Rohan: Eomer?
Generally, we don't pick a hero for this category, but that's pretty much all we're left with. Eomer consistently killed his foes (losing only 2 fights in 8 rounds) and wrecked havoc on my lines early in the game (not to mention made my Heroic Combat virtually impossible to win). I scored a great advantage by killing his horse, but as always, that didn't slow him down from finishing off more of my men. All told, he did well for a hero who costs less than 100 points to field.
Stellar unit for Isengard: Uruks with Pikes
Ok, so I really like my pikes. Not only do they allow me to fight Boromir with the same number of dice without testing for courage, but they also allow me to capitalize on killing trapped units. When engaged in combat, their Defense 5 keeps them alive against most blows (or at least as well as any other infantry). Their Fight 4 and Strength 4 also makes them great troops once engaged. In this fight, they fought well both on their own and in phalanx support. I really liked how they worked.
