Dispatches from the Front: business as usual…

I was in the pub the other night catching up with a friend, when he spied the figure case lurking under the table.

‘What’s that?’

‘I’ve been wargaming this evening.’

‘How do you do that, then?’

‘Well, I put my toy soldiers on the table, my opponent puts his on the table, we both roll lots of dice, and then I lose.’

Well, I was speaking somewhat tongue-in-cheek but I am getting a bit fixated on the fact that I haven’t won consistently since I was the Black Terror of GW Jimbocho (and hardly up against the toughest of opposition). Normal service was once again resumed last night as I took on the Duke at WOTR.

I wheeled out the Morgul Knights and the Orcs again while my opponent reconstituted three boxed sets of Easterlings and a couple of blisters into a mid-sized archer formation and a biggish (six companies) infantry phalanx with various upgrades and Khamul the Easterling.

We played on a small table, theoretically for control of the central building (which was actually too small for any of our troops to occupy it) but this was obviously just going to be another big scrap. With hindsight the tone was set by the first few turns where the Ringwraith magically boosted the Easterling infantry across the table at jaw-dropping speed, outmanoeuvering my attempts to get round his flanks.

A few turns later he was in a position to start opening up with his archers and rather than see my Knights get whittled down I was eventually forced into a frontal charge – I had the choice of going in with an already-slightly-whittled Knight unit led by a Commander or the Dark Marshal’s full-strength formation, and went for the latter option, supported by the remnants of the Orcs (who’d been shredded by magic in various ways). The Knights delivered a fairly big hit, considering, but the massed Easterling ranks – plus the fact they’d been boosted up to Str 6, again by Khamul’s magic – resulted in the Knights and Orcs getting wiped out.

A few turns of the Knights dancing around the archers trying to get a flank charge in resulted, but I was out of Might and had no real defence against Khamul’s sorcery with the Dark Marshal gone. In the end the Knights got transfixed in front of the Easterling infantry, had to receive the charge, and got pulped.

So, obviously, lots of stuff to consider as a result. The main ones are my general shortage of manpower (okay, Orcpower) and particular shortage of shooting. I was particularly struck by how well the Nazgul worked in a big infantry block – the Easterling phalanx outmoving and outcharging my cavalry thanks to Wings of Terror was a nasty shock, while the sheer size of the unit meant he could cast Strength from Corruption on it repeatedly without thinning them out too much (Khamul’s ability to transfer 33% of the damage the infantry took onto my units wasn’t as influential as I’d feared it might be). I had half the infantry, and in any case Orcs are a step or two down from Easterlings in terms of effectiveness – at the moment they’re just in the list to bulk it out a bit, but I can’t really afford an 115-point filler unit in a 500 point army.

The shooting issue is a tricky one. Not having any myself the Duke could use his to pressure me into attacking in force too early, which cost me the game. The question is how I get it – Orc archers are, again, a step down from Easterlings, and you only get one company per Orc box set – fine if I was looking to bulk out on Mordor Orcs generally, but I’m not sure I am! Orc Trackers are an option, I suppose, with some nice options, and not much more expensive than the plastics, but I’m also looking at some siege bows – do I want a few high strength hits with a massive range or more dice at a much lower range and strength? Decisions, decisions.

Anyway, the current project is just to finish highlighting and basing the existing army. Rather to my surprise the Duke asked if my Morgul Knights could go in one of the GW Oxford display cases (hurrah) as an example of a ‘work-in-progress army’ (oh – I didn’t tell him that I considered them pretty much done barring flock on the bases), so that was some sort of positive anyway. Next up: a Troll, to give the army a bit more wallop (and me a change from all the Morannon Orcs I’ve been fiddling about with).