builds a pond for his campaign.
After our learning game, my original plan was to ship off two Mighty Armies armies to the Philippines, so that Editor Julia and a friend could begin playing on their own. However, Julia wanted more practice games, so we came up with a compromise: The TMP Dwarf army is a double army (two boxes). So half the army is now on its way to the Philippines, while the other half remains at TMP New York for gaming via videochat.
Julia used the Four Enemies campaign system to start a campaign. Her Land of Sunshine Dwarves would be defending against an invasion by the Orcs of Ohuger's Land. On the edge of a woodlands, her Dwarves (35 points) would meet an Orc army (30 points).
The Orc army was generated randomly by the campaign system, and was a large army of weak troops: a Warlord, some Orc hordes (2), Orc archers (3), Goblin hordes (2), and Goblin Wolf Riders (3).
Due to a bug in the campaign system (which I need to fix...), the Dwarf army had to be modified from the randomly generated proposal, and ended up as the Dwarven King, Rangers (1), Warriors (4), and Crossbowmen (2) – a small but tough force, as we would see...
I lost the dieroll, and had to set up first. I decided to go with a strong right flank, so put my Warlord and the Orc Hordes on the right, a column of Goblins in the center, and the Goblin Wolf Riders on the left with Orc archers behind.
Julia deployed a solid battleline of warriors, with rangers in the center and crossbows on the ends. Her King was protected behind the main line. (Note that she chose not to use the special Ranger ability to deploy elsewhere on the tabletop.)
The first move went to Julia. She advanced her rangers from the center of her line, as well as her right-flank crossbows.
In my move, the dice gods were generous, and all my forces advanced at full speed.
Julia now advanced the rest of her army, reforming the original battleline. In the shooting phase, her crossbows eliminated one of the Goblin Wolf Riders.
First blood to Julia!
During my move, I advanced my right flank at the pace of the slowest troops (Goblins!). The Goblin Wolf Riders moved to threaten the flank of the battleline, unmasking the Orc archers. The archers concentrated fire on the opposing crossbows... and missed.
Julia now advanced two of her warrior units to attack the Orc Warlord and his minions...
...and swung her right-flank crossbows around to face the Goblin Wolf Riders.
Julia's ambitious attack on the Orc Warlord's group failed, killing one warrior unit, while the other warriors retreated in an orderly manner (Disciplined attribute).
Then her crossbows eliminated more Goblin Wolf Riders.
During my move, I sent my Orc hordes to destroy the crossbows in front of them...
...reorganized my Goblin hordes from column to line, and sent my last Goblin Wolf Riders to charge the other crossbows... which got them killed.
But the other crossbows died before my hordes!
Orc archery, however, continued to be ineffectual...
Julia then confidently advanced her single unit of warriors against the Orc hordes which had slain the crossbows – slaying one of the hordes, and forcing the other to retreat!
On the other side of the field, her warriors flanked the Goblin hordes...
...slaying one unit in the attack, and forcing the other to retreat.
I then attacked with my Warlord and the (recovered) Orc horde against her single warrior unit... scoring a deadlock. In Julia's turn, she reinforced with her ranger unit.
and attacked... only to lose, eliminating the rangers and forcing the warriors to retreat.
Fortuitously, the Orc archers chose this moment to finally kill something (Dwarf warriors) – which meant that both armies were one element away from defeat!
So Julia rashly attacked with her lone warrior unit against my Orc hordes (with my Warlord in support)! I tried to warn her... Well, she rolled high and I rolled low... the Orc horde died, my Warlord ran away...
(Sorry for the blurry photo – my hands must have been shaking with grief...)
