Krüger is one of my best friends who lived in Berlin for a long time, studying philosophy. We have played many tabletop games and we also played Badminton regularly, talking incessantly about strategy games during the breaks.
Unfortunately, Krüger moved to Dortmund at the end of March. A few weeks before he left we wrote a scenario for Dragon Rampant, D3+2 Objectives, which we also tested several times.
This blog post is about the last game we played when Krüger still lived in Berlin. It was the 16th game of our campaign "Beyond the Pillars of Heracles", taking place on the imaginary island Waltrop. As objective markers we used some mud huts, I recently finished.
The Greeks, who had landed on the northwestern coast of Waltrop some time ago, had put the orc tribes, living there, under a lot of pressure and now made a move to attack one of their villages (hexagon 20 on the campaign map). Heracleides the Great commanded the Greek army himself.
Krüger played the orcs defending the village with this army list:
Elite Foot (Leader) / 2 Bellicose Foot / Light Foot / Heavy Riders / Light Riders (Short Range Missiles)
I played the Greek attackers:
Elite Foot (Leader + Enchanted Weapon) / 2 Heavy Foot / Light Missiles / Light Riders (Short Range Missiles) / Scouts
Both generals got the trait Boneshaker as the result of a roll on the leader traits table.
This map shows the initial deployment of both armies. Krüger wrote the following battle report which I translated from German to English. (Orcs speak German, of course.) I took the pictures and drew the maps.
This map shows the initial deployment of both armies. Krüger wrote the following battle report which I translated from German to English. (Orcs speak German, of course.) I took the pictures and drew the maps.
Deployment
It was my intention to attack mainly from the centre and from my left flank, so I placed two large orc warbands (bellicose foot) and the orc boss (elite foot) in the centre. On my left, a unit of goblin wolf riders (light riders) was ready to threaten the objective on my opponent’s side.
The Greek used their light riders in a similar way, to threaten the objective on my right side. Both objectives on their side of the table were protected by units of hoplites (heavy foot).
Their centre was rather weak. It had scouts and light missiles. Heracleides, the general, (elite foot) stood in the back to protect it.
The First Turns
During their first turns, the Greek Hoplites formed shieldwalls next to the mud huts on their side. Their scouts and light shooters sent arrows in the direction of the advancing orcs which made me loose two boar riders.
The orc boss got close enough to attack the scouts and destroyed them in two turns.
The boar riders moved to the right to defend the goblin spears against the Greek light riders and to protect the objective on my right flank.
On my left flank the goblin wolf riders broke under the arrows of the Greek bows.
Now most units were close enough to move into close combat and the eventful middle phase of our game began.
The middle Phase of our Game
Turn 6
The Greeks prepared themselves for the onslaught of the orcs and fired a last volley of arrows at them, but in vain.
On my right flank the boar riders attacked the Greek light riders. Although the orcs slew two Greeks and only suffered one loss themselves, they broke and fled towards the woods. Then the goblin spears attacked the Greek riders. Both units suffered one loss. To my great disappointment the cowardly goblins broke.
Meanwhile the orc boss attacked the Greek light shooters, three archers lost their life, but my general also suffered a wound. The retreating archers were attacked by one of my orc warbands and broke.
Turn 7
Heracleides seized his chance and attacked the orc boss. The orc was wounded twice and Heracleides lost a man. This loss broke Heracleides’ moral and made him flee in the direction of the attacker’s table edge.
All the orc units rallied. The orc warband on my left angrily assaulted the Greek Hoplites who received them in a "Wall of Spears" formation. One Hoplite and two orcs died, but the orcs broke again.
Meanwhile the goblin wolf riders rode back to protect the mud hut in the centre on my side and the boar riders rode towards my general in order to help him.
Turn 8
Heracleides and his men rallied. The Greek light horse rode towards the objective in my centre, to attack the goblin riders I had just moved there.
My second orc warband also had to make a wild charge towards the hoplites on my left side. Their fate was even worse. They suffered three losses and were destroyed immediately.
Now the orc boss attacked Heracleides, but wasn’t lucky. He lost another strength point.
The End
Heracleides seized his chance, attacked the orc boss and killed him. What followed was a streak of bad luck. Each of my units had to test courage because I had lost my general. The result was that all my mounted units - the wolf riders and the boar riders - were removed from the table.
Until this happened the orcs had a real chance to win the game, but now their losses were too big. The Greeks won the game and now occupy the village in hexagon 20 on the campaign map.
Conclusion
Until turn 6 it looked very well for my orcs. I couldn’t wrap things up though, as I failed so many courage tests. Even then I had a chance to win. I had troops, able to occupy the objectives on my side and troops going for the objectives on the opponent’s side, while the Greek light cavalry was no real threat, being too far away from my objectives. The end came a bit sudden. The last two turns I lost too many troops.
The game was exciting and full of action until the end. It was lots of fun. I think our scenario works well and lets you play games that are undecided and exciting until the end.