Led by the famed ranger captain, Herneas the Hunter, King Billiam XXXVII, Queen Chelgar, and Gram the Stone Priest were led through the dark wood just outside of Alrenn, their current base of operations. Herneas’s hand-picked ranger regiments fanned out among the varied pines, spruces, and firs, as Billiam, atop his steed and accompanied by the rest of his retinue, marched solemnly and silently.
The permanent residents of Alrenn have long whispered rumors of fearsome creatures dwelling in the forest. Most thought these were merely bedtime stories told to misbehaving children. “The Witch of the Woods dwells in the forest! Mind your chores or she’ll eat you up!”
King Billiam has seen far too much to ignore mentions such as these. A thick forest of good, solid trees such as this will make fine materials for the Gal’Durak war machine, but the King had to ensure his people were safe before any logging operation began…
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A withered, seemingly-frail wrist gave the bones another toss…change, upheaval, outsiders, these things they predicted. With a dry cackle, Zorida straightened up, her crooked back giving a faint creak and a loud pop. The infamous Witch of the Woods stared down from her hut, its height elevated by tall, stork-like stilts, her eyes looking over the copse of gnarled and wizened trees, in the distance the remains of a shattered tower poked its broken peak through the canopy. These woods, the ancient Ruins of Vrett, all was her domain.
With a faint whisper, a breeze passed through the trees, agitating leaves, and stirring around the hag. Raising a hand, as if to embrace the wind, Zorida whispered, “Yes my pets, you have done well, dwarves in the outer marches. We shall see how they fare against my children.” Passing into a deep trance, the hag swayed back and forth, ethereal dark winds whipping around her, whispers, shrieks, and howls echoing around the copse.
Pre-Game Mediations: Billy
For our first battle report, the two of us decided that we would play a much more narrative scenario to showcase how Kings of War can tell a really good story as well as be the best set of mass fantasy rules on the map. Since King Billiam XXXVII had sought to claim the woods near Alrenn as his own, we felt like an ambush type scenario would be perfect for this game.
Fortunately, Destiny of Kings already has an ambush scenario, so we didn’t even have to write one ourselves! The Flanked scenario on page 52 of Destiny of Kings basically pits a defender, King Billiam’s forces in this case, against an attacker. The defender deploys all of their forces within a 12 inch wide band across the middle of the table. The attacker then deploys their forces in two 12 inch bands on the short ends of the table. The defender wins if they are able to keep 20% of their force alive at the end of the game.
We also decided to use the Battlefield Cards for this game. King Billiam’s forces received 3 strategy cards (to represent the fact that they were prepared for a conflict) and Zorida’s army received only 1.
Pre-Game Mediations: Jake
For our campaign game, we selected the Flanked mission from the Destiny of Kings campaign supplement. I would serve as the attacker, giving an interesting advantage, my army would be attacking from both sides, and Billy’s forces would deploy in the center of the board. Billy and I both agreed we wanted a thematic and narrative battle, so I took a list that I felt reflected some of the narrative I had established.
List
- Horde of Scarecrows with Crystal Pendant
- Horde of Scarecrows with Banner of the Griffin
- x4 Regiments of Scarecrows
- x2 Regiments of Dopplegangers
- Mindscreech
- x2 Hordes of Butchers
- Shadow Hulk
- Banshee with Alchemist Curse
- Butcher Formation
For my strategy, I drew “Sudden Faith,” which would allow me one time to subtract 1 from a nerve test made by an opponent. I plan to hold onto this and use it to save something like the Shadow Hulk or Mindscreech from a lucky nerve check.
My overall strategy is to deploy my force into two semi-capable halves. I don’t need to deploy even, so I plan to deploy all 6 Scarecrow units, the 2 Dopplegangers, and the Mindscreech on one side, and the Butchers, Shadow Hulk, and Banshee on the other side. My general thought is the Scarecrows represent bodies to hit and hold, while the other side has the raw power. This will hopefully force the tough but less maneuverable dwarves to choose to either get a TON of weak attacks in flanks and rears from Scarecrows or get hit by my scary stuff. The Dopplegangers I am hoping will serve as an “ace in the hole” on this side, as they mimic the attack stats of the opponent — not the best against dwarves, but should still be useful.
Finally, I am hoping my small amount of decent shooting will be able to annoy and peel off supporting units. Mostly though, I am hoping to get in some cool Windblasts!
Turn 1
With two slow armies, unsurprisingly Turn one wasn’t very eventful. Both sides traded off shots; however, the dwarves got the best of the exchange putting a whopping 11 wounds onto the Shadowhulk! The beast was in trouble, as it would be at least 1 more turn before it got into combat.
Turn 2
Turn 2 saw the continued determined advance of the Nightstalkers. The Banshee, in a mistake, moves within charge range of the Dwarf Berzerker Lord on Brock.
The two sides exchange a further volley of shots, with the Nightstalkers scattering some damage, but the dwarf ranger fire being the biggest influence. The poor Shadow Hulk took another 5 damage, putting it up to 16 damage, and the Butchers to the left take 7 damage!
If the Nightstalkers didn’t get in combat soon, there wouldn’t be much left of the “strong” attack. Luckily for the Nightstalkers the dwarves failed to break the Shadow Hulk, even with a tactics reroll, and the Banshee survived!
Turn 3
As the despicable nightmares continue to march forward, the dwarfs vie for strong positions. The rangers command their hunting packs to jump in front of their lines to allow them to continue firing unmolested. Spotting an opportunity, the plucky Battle Driller charges the heavily injured Shadow Hulk, finally taking down the beast. King Billiam and one of his regiments of rangers charge into a horde of Butchers, crushing them underfoot.
Turn 4
The winds of fate blow favorably for the Nightstalkers, and a number of big things happen, helping the beleaguered forces of the Hag. First, the left flank finally starts hitting the dwarves, putting pressure on the defenders on both fronts.
Then, the Butchers slay the Brock Lord, and overrun into the Elementals, doing enough damage to destroy the elemental horde as well, leaving a big gap in the dwarven line on the right flank. The scarecrows also do an impressive amount of damage to the elemental horde!
The icing on the cake for this turn was the twist of fates that happens during the dwarf turn. Billy charges the very damaged Butcher horde, and just barely breaks them with the roll of a 3; however, Jake uses his Strategy card to subtract 1 from the roll, meaning the unit failed to kill the Butchers!
Turn 5
The Hag, annoyed that the Stone Priest keeps absorbing all the damage her troops are doing, hops over the fight in front of her, and zaps the Stone Priest, ending the dwarf’s access to healing. The Butchers slay the Battle Driller that is attempting to hold them off, and pivot to continue to threaten the right side!
In the dwarf turn, the King on Large Beast slams into the Butchers, finally slaying the final part of the Nightstalker right flank. The Earth Elementals and Rangers slay the Horde of Scarecrows, but then the units blows up, dealing massive amounts of damage to both units! Huge, with the Mindscreech and Banshee so close by.
Turn 6
Jake’s shooting takes out the injured pieces of the dwarf forces, and the dopplegangers get a cheeky flank on the greater golem, taking the beast out. Even the scarecrow horde put on a good show, dealing several points of damage to the rangers.
Despite the dwarf’s forces beginning to collapse, Jake has only 1 more turn to reduce the invading forces to below 20%, or the defenders win the game!
Turn 7
The dwarfs finally kill the Horde of Scarecrows; however, the Nightstalkers do very little damage in their own turn. At the end of the game the dwarves still have well over 20% of their forces left, meaning it is a victory to King Billiam!
Post Game Thoughts: Jake
Wow, isometric battles like this are a LOT of fun, especially when mixing in unknown elements like Strategy cards.
Overall, I think my plan on sandwiching the dwarves was solid; however, I should have divided my forces differently. My left flank became very cluttered, getting in each other’s way, and slowing down an already plodding advance. The right flank could also have used some more higher nerve threats, to beef them out and let something survive beyond turn 4.
Scarecrows in general are terrible against this style of dwarf list, if you have to kill the enemy, because they just can’t put wounds on fast enough, and get shredded apart on the return hits. I was also really amazed how quickly Billy was able to pull down the Shadow Hulk with basically just shooting. In my mind I thought big stompy monster, LETS GO, but the reality is Defense 4 and no Stealthy leaves it highly susceptible to even basic shooting.
As a first game with Nightstalkers I had a lot of fun. Dopplegangers are cool to use, blowing up scarecrows is a blast, and having a Banshee zip around damaging with Windblast is really cool!
With most of her Children destroyed, and the Dreamer having fled, Zorida was forced to withdraw. For the time being, the dwarves had gained a foothill in her Forest. However, their coming had been a surprise, and the Hag was largely unprepared. The next fight, she would have awakened more of the beings of Vrett, coaxing the dark nightmares on the ancient world out from the deep places of the woods. People had been telling stories of her woods for generations, each story based on some kernel of fact that gave birth to a myth. The children of Vrett would march, and they were not kind to those that forced them from their dark pleasures.
Post Game Thoughts: Billy
With the Rangers finally finishing the seemingly endless horde of Scarecrows, the remaining dwarfs were able to make a break for the edge of the forest. King Billiam found his wounded queen lying unconscious, guarded fiercely by her mount, Chonk. Quickly, carrying her onto the saddle of his own mount, he beckoned for Chonk to follow as they ran back to the relative safety of Alrenn. In their wake, Billiam ordered the forest burned to the ground…
We had an incredible game! At first it felt as though the Nightstalkers had the upper hand, and they did if we were playing a traditional scenario. However, since the dwarfs of New Gal’Durak only had to keep 20% of their list alive (200 points), they were able to squeak out a win. All in all, a wonderful time and we are both looking forward to our next opponents.
Tune in next month for more exploits of Zorida’s Nightstalkers and the Dwarfs of New Gal’Durak!
Sounds like an awesome game!
I got the gist of it, but had a little trouble following. A list of the dwarf army would have been cool. I figured it out, but being told would have been nicer.
Maps are always good, but didn’t match the text right above them. Separating the player turns and having a map of the end of each (possibly even with arrows!) would have made it easier to follow and imagine the action!
You are absolutely right and that’s definitely something for all of us to consider going forward. This is my first time ever doing something like this, so feedback like that is invaluable.
That said, I’m glad you enjoyed what we did! I’ll try and improve on my next one.