TOW 2000 r vs Wood Elves (narrative 1)

[discomute]

Spoiler: Army list

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Campaign [1687 pts]
Warhammer: The Old World, Lizardmen, Renegade, Combined Arms
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++ Characters [662 pts] ++

Venertalli [310 pts]
- Hand weapon
- Level 4 Wizard
- General
- Battle Standard Bearer
- High Magic (no vortex or assailment+ monsoon)

Aeontezin [180 pts]
- Hand weapon
- Heavy armour (Scaly skin)
- Shield
- Cold One
- Hide of the Cold Ones

Azcaramani [112 pts]
- Great weapon
- Heavy armour (Scaly skin)
- Cold One

Skicahua (sky qua) [60 pts]
- Hand weapon
- Light armour (Calloused hide)
- Wizard [Level 1 Wizard]
- On foot
- Elementalism (wind blast)

++ Core Units [472 pts] ++

26 Temple Guard [437 pts]
- Hand weapons
- Halberds
- Shields
- Heavy armour (Scaly skin)
- Revered Guardian (champion)
- Standard bearer
- Musician

12 Skink Skirmishers [35 pts]
- Hand weapons
- Javelins
- Shields
- Light armour (Calloused hides)
- Vanguard

++ Special Units [98 pts] ++

4 Kroxigors [98 pts]
- Great weapons
- Heavy armour (Scaly skin)

5 cold one riders

++ Rare Units [455 pts] ++

Troglodon [200 pts] (hammerhands)
- Venomous talons
- Venom spray
- Heavy armour (Scaly skin)
- Skink Oracle with Hand weapon

Ancient Stegadon [255 pts]
- Hand weapons
- Javelins
- Great horns
- Engine of the Gods

Note only 50 points of equipment or mounts allowed for old one & Slann and 25 for scar vet & priest

He has
- treeman lord
- treeman
- block of archers
- hero
- lord
- caster
- glaive guard
- more h2h infantry
- scouts
- sisters

Scenario - the first linked battles with its zones is an odd one! This is how it looked after we set up

Turn 1 - him


I said from the start that with this sort of a battle the first turn was going to win! Unfortunately we didn't get it, as we had some ridiculous charges lined up

Although the wood elves weren't able to do too much damage they did bring everything on early

Turn 1 - me

I failed a difficult charge with my trog (needing a 5) but I got in there with the old blood. Some good rolling from my opponent

The cold ones hit the glaive guard - striking at the same time (elves initiative is just disgusting) we did a fair bit of damage but in return were totally wiped out except for the scar vet Azcaramani.

You notice his hero on a tree on the board edge, well my big brain play was to arrive the priest next to him, move up and hit him with wind blast. On a 7+ he was off the board, but I couldn't get that.

The Slann failed in nearly all magic and overall it was a disappointing start

At least the stegadon managed to shoot all the scouts off the table

Turn 2 - him


Double charging my skinks they fired and managed to get the sisters down to 2. Combat went well enough that we stick around.

Trog got shot off the board

Scar vet died but not before taking a few down with him.

Priest was smashed by the wood elf hero

Turn 2 - me


The skinks were left with two but still were sticking around.

Things were going badly but the Slann tried to get us back into it with a fiery convercation "hit" and it smashed apart his infantry taking 11 with it.

I did note in a linked battle sensible thing really is to quit here to avoid further loss but nah...

Turn 3 - him


His archers take 3 wounds off the stegadon

Skinks die and sisters off the table

Two treeman and the remains of the unit charge my temple guard block. Just when we thought it was going to a devestating loss the Saurus manage to win combat res by 2. Infantry in 1.5!

However one of the biggest rolls of the game where the Saurus are unable to catch his treeman general who FBIGO, which proves very costly

Rest of game
The Saurus keep charging the general who keeps fleeing and rallying. In a last ditch effort to do something fiery convercation hits the archers killing half but they don't flee.

Eagle destroys my baggage train

Stegadon kills his hero but gets shot himself to death

The treeman hits the krox and rolls well, we do a few wounds but we get wiped out

1302 v 627 loss for us.

Breakdown

So much rested on the first turn and my opponents early luck didn't help. I will also say that the trog and cold one riders are suboptimal choices that I enjoy, but my opponent has really upped his game with wood elves since we played a year ago.

The only thing I am kicking myself is forgetting wisdom of the old ones for the Slann, an extra spell or two cast could have been a big difference.

Aftermath

Well, as it's a narrative battle this time it was interesting as I rolled very well. All my characters are coming back. My only unit loss for next time was the cold one riders. I will also be short 2 krox and 6 skinks

My opponent has lost less but his hero is permanently dead

Overall next battle will be about 1650 to 1750 (although each of characters get an extra 50 magic item points) so still winnable for me.

 

[discomute]

OPPONENTS COMMENTARY:
Great game! One of my favourites. This one has made me love not only Old World, and not only wood elves, but campaigning. Couldn't have been happier with that!

Right from the first deployment the whole game felt different. Having the first turn certainly did help a lot; I was going to say maybe not as much as Discomute said, but I did manage to scoot my Sister's away from a losing position and from there rode some good dice (particularly on dispels) to a wipeout result.

What's not a wipeout, though is the campaign going forward. I've lost Glade Captain Caeldhir, who I was hoping to babysit through the early games as a chip damage sniper until he earned a wild stag but that will not be happening. Losing the cold ones is gonna hurt next game, but I managed to kill 3 of his 4 characters today and all I managed was a few grunt kills and some low consequence leadership penalties.

And, while I don't want to rub it in, (maybe lizard tempers were being frayed in the end) but I think the Slann made a mistake at the end calling off the temple guard chase against Treeman Ancient Eryndor to get some cheap kills against Lord Caelhir and his archers. Even the best convocation had no chance of killing them all, but Eryndor couldn't have safely run away, had no chance of winning that combat, and having already used his stubborn, had every likelihood of running off the table and being forced to take a very dangerous roll on destroyed units.

On to game 2 I say!