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This is my personal space about YMG's Battleground: Fantasy and Historical Warfare miniatureless miniatures game. If you love miniatures wargames, but are put off by the expense in time and money of collecting and painting all those figures, this is the game for you! If you are unfamiliar with Battleground simply click on the tutorial link below and watch a quick sample combat. Next, click on the forum link and meet some really great folks who will be responsive and answer all your questions. If you are already familiar with BG:FW&HW this site is an adjunct to the forums where I put up my own brand of replays and and stuff that just wouldn't fit in the forum (but I'll post links!).

Monday, November 10, 2014

Orcs v. Dwarves Pinch and Roll

This Battle was originally played with the intention of testing some Goblin Bomb Chucker variations, which I did, but really it shows the classic Battleground ideal of Pinch and Roll where one player starts pinching on one side of a line and rolls it up. The GBC variation was that the player could choose to roll 1-3 dice for the number of dice to roll to hit. On a nine or higher it caused one damage to the Chucker, but still shot. On a 15 or higher it caused two damage but still shot. This means that by only rolling one die the machine would not harm itself, whereas with 3 dice you would be limited on how many big attacks you could do before your machine fell apart from the stress of being overclocked!

I started with my most recent Orc build but swapped out the two AxeOrcs with two Goblin Bomb chuckers, and this was to face an army that had no large or colossal units that were overly susceptible to artillery fire. The army was the Dwarves of Runegard.

I was also trying out my new session report technique of using picmonkey to diagram the movement of the units rather than a series of fotos which can be difficult to follow and rarely include pics of every turn. Now Orcs v Dwarves is not my favorite matchup because it tends to be light on maneuver, but maybe this was better for a first go with the new technique. I'm planning on doing some 1000pt battles, which tend to be very maneuver focused, to try and really showcase the possibilities.

After printing out the map to diagram the turns, it occurred to me how ink thirsty a dark green mapboard printout is. In the future I will use picmonkey to lighten and even black and white the printout which will make it use less ink and easier to read and mark up. Of course, the posted pics will be in full color!

I can dispense with the usual Order of Battle for the report, as the setup foto is clearly labeled. The dwarves spent 1988 pts, to the Orcs 1999. Dwarves moved first.
                                                           
                                                         Initial Deployment

Turn 1
On the first turn the dwarves begin their advance forward and the Dwarven Battle Axes on the left begin to roll out. The Orc infantry mirrors the Dwarves while the Goblin Wolfriders move laterally to see if they can draw out the lone Antonians on the Dwarven right. The Goblin Bomb Chuckers elect to roll 3 dice and roll a 9 and a 4, the nine causes one damage on the Bomb Chucker and neither shot does any damage to the Dwarves.

                                                                     Turn 2
 Turn 2 sees Lashing and Sprinting on the hills to keep the lines even. The flanking infantry on both sides struggle to keep up. The GBC's roll 2 dice for a  5 (2 damage on the Battle Axes) and a 4 (for 0 damage on the Spears).

                                                                    Turn 3
The Dwarves charge on their turn and the lines engage!  The Antonians woosh in for a pinch and the SwordOrcs go Boom! The Antonians(2) Pivot action right as the wolfriders scramble to threaten the Antonians. Turn 3 ends up being the best turn for the GBC's as they roll an 8 for maximum dice with no automatic damage (doing 1 hit) and rolling a 14 for the most dice without incurring 2 damage (doing 3 hits).
                                                                      Turn 4
A study in rolling up a line with pinches. Both Antonians turn to engage the Wolfriders while the Spears pinch and explode the SpearOrcs.The Longbeards force a courage check on the SpearOrcs facing them and those Orcs have had enough, first failing the check for going in the yellow and then failing the post rout combat check. The GBC's get hot and roll 13 and 9 doing 3 hits each, but one is now disrupted as is its target.

                                                                Final Map Array
At this point the Orcs throw in the towel. The following rear guard action would be interesting as the Wolf riders might just be able to drop the Antonians down to the red before they are wiped out and then the GBCs could finish them off. Could they do it before the dwarven infantry swarms them? Probably not, depends on how much the remaining SpearOrcs could slow them down.


I'm curious what people think of the Picmonkey battle report. I'm getting faster at doing it, so that's a plus. This battle didn't involve a lot of movement and maneuvers. In the future I might switch to more pictures, but each picture has to be relabeled and that gets very time consuming. Just adding arrows is the fastest way to go, but if the battle involved a lot of maneuver it would get too confusing to sort out. Probably somewhere in the middle with just a few pictures would be the best bet. What do you think?

2 comments:

  1. Nice report. Arrows could be somewhat more visible (maybe making them white?). But very well done batrep, nonetheless. Cheers.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks man! I appreciate the input on the arrows, and I agree.

    ReplyDelete