Thursday 22 May 2014

The Battle of Otten Village - Part 1

This week I played my first game of Warhammer Fantasy in over three years, and my first of 3rd edition in much longer than that, with Fimm McCool. No doubt we both made a lot of mistakes and we played a little fast and loose with the rules but a great time was had. Read on for an introduction to the battle.

Prologue


A woman came screaming and stumbling through the woods, almost blundering straight into Dorrin "Help us, help us! The deamon-fiends - we can't hold them off!" She took a look at who she had run into and she fell to her knees, sobbing uncontrollably. An angry, winged dwarf with a retinue of beast-things were not who she was hoping to come across.

Dorrin was about to tell the woman to be gone as he had more important things to do, there were still Slaaneshi worshippers to run down after all, but the whisper told him to stop and consider her. "Were her people not like him," the whisper said "unable to return to their homes, their families murdered? Would they not also desire vengeance and relish spilling the blood of their tormentors?" Dorrin thought on this for a moment then walked over to the woman and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Aye lass, we'll help you - take us to your home."

She looked up at him and the surrounding company, considered her options and decided the they were favourable to the marauding deamonfolk. After all, aren't dwarves meant to be good, and there was an elf too, aren't elves meant to be kind? She'd never met either an Elf or a Dwarf before and she wondered if all dwarves have wings, or maybe only those that live above ground like this one. Certainly all the folk tales she knew suggested that both dwarf and elf were benevolent, so she stood up, dusted herself down and - being unsure how to address a dwarf - did a curtsey. "My Lord my name is Marta, Otten lies this way, please hurry." 


Classic Warhammer - lining up to fight at a jaunty angle.


As he peered across the fields at the hulking figures marching towards Otten he felt a flicker of remembrance. Those 'deamon-fiends' were fimir and not only that but he recognised them, their unnatural size and tattoos gave them away. The Clan Myeri fimir had a pride of place in Dorrin's family's book of grudges, his aunt had been carried away many years ago by these same creatures when he was but a beardling and the blood debt had never been paid. He smiled to himself, he would have a chance to right a great wrong today.


The outskirts of Otten

Army Lists


"My acoloytes." boomed Dorrin "Prepare yourselves for today we strike out a long unsettled grudge. Our honour will be satisfied, vengeance will be had, blood will pay for blood." The assembled creatures shouted back "Blood will pay for blood!" The whisper in his head quietly responded too, although it's words were lost to Dorrin in the heat of the moment "Blood for the Blood God."

Dorrin and his warband

Dorrin and Followers
Dorrin Blissbane - Dwarf 10 Hero berserker
Gifts: Resilience (+1T) and vestigial wings (cosmetic)
Lustdrinker: Magic two-handed axe (Might and Breathe)

Melondil Nightnoon - Dark Elf 5 Hero
Halberd, light armour, crossbow

8 Beastmen
 Shields, light armour and hand weapons

7 Skaven
Shields, light armour and spears

2 Trolls


The village of Otten, barely more than a hamlet in truth, lay in a woodland clearing at the edge of the Empire. Once it had been a thriving community but in recent months a band of fimir had taken residence in the nearby crags and wetlands - their vile magic causing the surrounding area to grow swampy and dark. Raids by the Fimir had devastated Otten and now only the hardiest or most desperate villagers remain, the rest fleeing, dead or carried off by their inhuman assailants.


Fergus MacShea and his Fianna Fimm

The raiding party of Clan Myeri
Fergus MacShea - Fimir 10 Hero
Light armour, hand weapon

5 Fianna Fimm (+3 shock elite)
Light armour, hand weapon

6 Fimm warriors
Hand weapons

The Scenario


The Fimir enter the battle from the 'swampy' edge of the field and have to raid the intact houses by spending a full turn in base-to-base contact with them. They then must scarper back off their table edge with their victims. The chaos warband starts at the opposite edge and must stop any villagers from being carried off.

The trolls are a bit of a wildcard. They will come on from the swamp side of the table on a roll of a 6+ on the 2nd turn, 5+ on the 3rd turn and so on and act normally on the turn they arrive. They will endeavour to attack the fimir if they can overcome their stupidity long enough. Their motivation is that since the fimir moved in they've been bullied out of their lovely bit of swamp - and they are taking this opportunity to give the ugly one-eyed brutes a good kicking (or just to vomit on them and then run off).

The Battle Plan


Fimir are tough, very tough - we're talking toughness five and two wounds each tough. They are also strong fighters with two attacks at either strength 4 or 5 each. In order for my beastmen to stand a chance in combat I had Dorrin be their leader so that when he goes into a frenzy (automatically when charging or being charged), the rest of the unit will frenzy too! This gives them a big bonus to their damage and durability and should let me fight on a more even footing.

I don't have much hope for the skaven inflicting any casualties, but if they can cause a couple of panic checks by charging flanks then that will be great. Melondil will lead the rats as he has two high strength attacks that could at least give them a fighting chance.

The trolls are just going to charge at the first opportunity as I can't guarantee getting a second chance due to stupidity. In theory, they'll only do what I tell them less than half the time! Their job is just to tie up the fimir for as long as possible and hopefully vomit on a couple of them. Lovely.

The forces deploy ready for battle! A couple of buildings were moved around from the initial setup.

Part two will be coming shortly and will cover the battle itself and the aftermath.

4 comments:

  1. Bloody great stuff Peter! Who hosted? That table is very nice.

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    1. Thank you, this was hosted at the Old Duke pub in Bristol. The manager is a gamer and has kindly set up a half dozen tables permanently in a function room. It's our go-to gaming venue since the local shop closed down (again) and has a lot of excellent terrain for club use.

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  2. Looks great. Awaiting the second installment with bated breathe.

    That's great place to be able to game too. Beer & miniatures = fun.

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    1. It'll be up in the next day or two. :)

      I have to say that a beer does help the game go more smoothly, although it probably also meant we weren't very rigorous about looking up the rules.

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