Face-off 2016 Final Théoden's Host Vs Rivendell

And finally the Face-off 2016 Final! The elves defeated the Serpent Horde from a heroic duel between the elven captain and Suladan, after a very close encounter with the Mordorians which also resulted in a heroic duel that the captain got the better of the orc from. The Rohirrim, meanwhile took a close, but deserved, victory over Moria in the first round from Erkenbrand's special rules, then a well fought victory over the Fiefdoms.

Rivendell Vs Théoden's Host (Domination)
Whoever claims more of the five objectives after one side is broken and a 1 or 2 is rolled on D6 (in end phase). Objectives are claimed by having more models within 3''/8cm when the game ends.


Setup

The elves fan out, and the Rohirrim concentrate on their left flank.

One of the elves gets caught in the bush and his brains are dashed
across the floor! The elves advance un-phased.

The Rohirrim stand off their adversaries, who simple charge them. 

Then both captain call a counter charge...

There is tremendous crash of steel as the sides clash, the elven captain
slices through two royal guards, who were looking at Erkenbrand stab
an elf in the face. Also another Rohan warrior falls to an elf spear.

Erkenbrand calls another charge allowing them to surround the elves,
and an elf is speared from three foot away.

Initially the elf captain took a deep leg cut from a throwing spear and
as he bent over to grab it Erkenbrand clove him in twain.
Another Rohan warrior gets speared too. 

Things are looking bleak for the elves, who have been broken,
but they stand fast hoping the battle will turn in their favour.

And so two more elves fall beneath either spear or sword of the Rohirrim.

Erkenbrand orders his guard to claim the remaining objectives.

While he fights fiercely with an elf, but knocks aside his shield
and drives his sword into the elven warriors gut.

The last elf stands, and fights a royal guard, although
neither has the better of the other.



Erkenbrand hastens to remove the faithful elf.



But his guard manages without...

And so the Rohirrim remove all the pesky elves from the field, and claim total victory!!

Théoden's Host = 10 + 5(breaking elves) + 3(killing elven captain) + 5(number of objectives claimed) = 23 
Rivendell = 4

This victory was far too easy for the Rohirrim. Their throwing spears really gave them the edge, allowing them to effectively roll-to-wound on a 4+, not only that but the initially killed elf really meant that the elves had to charge into the Rohan line in order to win the well or the number of objectives would be against them once either side was broken.

Overall Hero Kills
Erkenbrand = 12 (16)
Elven captain = 9 (15) or 19 (27) inc. play-offs
Suladan = 9 (11)
Duinhur = 8 (8)
Shagrat = 3 (3)
Goblin captain = 3 (3)
Goblin Shaman = 2 (2)

There are some clear candidates for the person of the tournament, Sadly Suladan won't be taking it this time, as despite the number of kills he was too easily neutralised by other forces in the last two scenarios. Erkenbrand fought well in his three scenarios, getting a reasonable amount of kills, however a decent portion of his sides kills were from his bodyguard. The elf captain, however, has played a key role in the elven successes, destroying the dwarves in the play-offs, killing Shagrat and Suladan in the first round and the semis with many other kills along the way, although the final was  a poor showing from the elven force, he still earns himself the Elf of the Tournament award for carrying his warband to the final battle.

So this concludes the Face-off 2016, albeit 5 months later than intended. I have done some other things over the Easter break, and they will be put up in due course :)

Until then

Fish

Face-off 2016 1st round Easterlings Vs The Serpent Horde

Finally! The first round of the Face-off starts!

Some history:
After being ejected from the last Face-off semi final by the Easterlings, the Haradrim are looking for revenge, and the Easterlings to avoid Suladan's blade long enough to kill a handful of his bodyguard. The Easterlings have a numerical and armour advantage, along with their spears, whereas the Haradrim have Suladan and...poisoned blades?

Easterlings Vs The Serpent Horde (A Clash of Piquets)

Setup...

Suladan moves to engage the Easterlings, as four of his
guard and five more appear from all sides.

The Easterlings brace for Suladan's charge as two more
from both sides enter the field.

Suladan prepares his horse, and thunders into the captain as 
his guard attack the golden warriors.

Suladan simply rides through the Easterling captain and two of his guard 
down,with barely a stride lost, the flashing blade spills blood everywhere!

The golden warriors spread no tear over their captain and pounce on the 
Serpent lord, while there is an intense melee close at hand.

The thicket of Easterling spears proves too much for Suladan's horse,
the blood stained animal hits the dirt along with an Easterling warrior.

The Easterlings continue to harry the Serpent lord and his guard, 
who are holding them up well.

Yet not well enough, the Serpent lord narrowly misses cutting the throat 
of a nearby Easterling. But both Forces attack again.

The Easterlings respond by cornering and slicing through the Serpent 
lords mail, leaving him barely breathing and somehow standing. Meanwhile
his guard actually do something by killing two Easterlings.

This Breaks the Easterlings, and means that the Haradrim are victorious!

Serpent Horde = 10 + 5(breaking enemy) + 3(killing captain) = 18
Easterlings = 4

Hero Kills
Suladan = 3 (5)

The Haradrim had the better of the Easterlings at times. It all came down to a heroic move early on, that favoured Suladan, and really meant that the Easterlings had to contain him and did so very well. Only disadvantage, his guards actually decided to start killing people.

The Haradrim get their revenge and progress! Next up Cirth Ungol Vs Rivendell.

Until then

Fish

Face-off 2016 teams and analysis

Face-off time!

This time there is an extra team and three more battles than normal. Moria have re-entered along with the Fiefdoms, while the last winners (Tower of Ecthelion) are absent.

The force composition rules are similar to last time:

• Must include one hero
• Must be no more than 150pts
• The force must not include more than 15 models, that are non-heroes (such that each side represents a warband not an army)

Here are the teams:

Cirth Ungol

The same force as last time around. The banner will hopefully be used to win more of the combats, meanwhile Shagrat is a solid hero that should be able to fight against most of the enemy heroes.



The Serpent horde

Again this force is the same as last time around, Suladan leads half a dozen infantry from horseback. The Serpent lord will provide the main threat and killing power while his guards go off and secure objectives.

Erebor

The dwarf captain with shield leads the side again, however the number of dwarf warriors has been changed to 9, three of them have shields. The main aim here is to use the two-handed axes to be able to kill better armoured enemy warriors.

Théoden's host

Erkenbrand gets another go at leading the Rohan forces, last time they left despite clearing the field of Haradrim. They must have done something right so the same force will be used here again. His supporting cast are 4 royal guard and 5 warriors with throwing weapons.

 

The Fiefdoms

After the debut success of this force, there are no changes. Duinhur is in command, and is supported by 6 knights of Dol Amroth and 4 clansmen of Lamedon.

Isengard raiders

Lurtz is the leader of the pack here, providing a stalwart melee and ranged capabilities, while the ten warriors have higher strength values that will be utilised to break down higher defence enemies.



The Easterlings

These Easterlings actually managed to get into the final battle last time around, so this force remains unchanged. They'll utilise the high defence warriors to phalanx their way to an ambitious third place.

Moria

The goblins have gone for a different approach, the captain and his 13 warriors will be attacking everything. Failing this the shaman will add some of his furious magic to help them along the way. This force could either flabbergast or flop in my opinion.

Rivendell

The heavily armoured elven captain leads the 7 heavily armoured elf warriors, 5 of whom have shields. This forces has the advantage for very long battles where courage values become important.

More of the same as last time apparently is the theme. Each force seems to be very well rounded, and no clear side stands out as being a favourite. Although the fiefdoms and the Serpent horde may edge the odds in both of their favours.

As mentioned previously the scenarios used for each of the first three battles are:

Rivendell Vs Moria (Reconnoitre)

Erebor Vs Rivendell (A Clash of Piquets)

Moria Vs Erebor (The High Ground)

And these three shall become two that'll go into the knockout stages.

Until then

Fish

Tis the season to be jolly!

Hello again!

So recently the activity on here has hit a new low. This is not only because of life at university presenting the continued existence of exams and of coursework to keep me occupied - But wait, what about the summer, surely you got time off there?

Well... not really.
I decided to embark in a journey that consisted of me trying and actually getting some form of summer job (to keep the parents off my case!)

That's all well and great, however my time spent on doing the war-gaming things I enjoy, not so great :(
Now I have time free! And with this free time I'll talk about the gaming I've planned for over the Christmas break.

In keeping with my own personal tradition, there will be a mini face-off during this time, although this isn't my favourite form of gaming in LOTR, it's a simple thing both to plan for and to follow. Which helps as I don't always have the freedom over Christmas to carry out extensive campaigns, huge battles, painting sessions and modelling terrain; which everyone would much prefer.

The difference this time around is that I've modified the setup a little: there's now a play off between three forces, two so through to the knockout stages, the rest is very similar:

The fiefdoms re-enter the competition after they won the 2013 competition, Moria also enter again alongside Erebor and Rivendell in the play-off stages. Tower of Ecthelion are absent as they won in 2014 (although the final was actually in 2015).

Another thing is that this is a face-off 2016, as by the time I get around to posting most of the battles (like last year) it will no longer be 2015. Kinda like last time when most of the posts for the face-off 2014 were in January 2015 *insert slapface*.

The warriors and heroes composing each force will be included in the next post, along with the scenarios of each encounter between the forces.

Until then

Fish

Face-off 2014 Final Easterlings Vs Tower of Ecthelion

So, after a series of surprising results and heroics, two forces have reached the final to decide the overall winner.

The Easterlings began by taking revenge over the Mordorian orcs, who were dispatched through lack of co-ordination and heavy armour deflecting the orc blades, despite Shagrat trying to buoy his force by killing a few Easterlings.
They then faced the Serpent horde, Suladan wasn't his usual self unable to cut through as many of the Easterners, so the captain gave no quarter and his men cut down their opponents with ease.

The Gondorians had to charge against a wall of elven spears, the elves behind refusing to back down, or attack much, which meant the knights could be cut down swiftly, but not enough as the Gondorian captain swiftly drove through the last elf levelling the kills made by either captain.
So they went through by virtue of wiping the elves from the field, they then came across an all out siege against the Isengard raiders who solely defended their camp and a lapse in concentration from Lurtz left him disembowelled on the floor. Neither side could rally very well, except one knight who stood alone to give the Gondorians a very close victory.

Easterlings Vs Tower of Ecthelion (Ill met by Moonlight)

Tactical movements.

The Easterlings take control of the pass.

This means the knights have to flank or be killed in the phalanx
so they retreat to defend the pass.

And the Knights charge into the hastily-formed Easterling wall.

Three are knocked bleeding in the dirt,
the captain turns to see this new threat.

And urges his men into the knights, but are attacked at the pass too 

The Easterling captain scythes and slashes through two knights,
as another is brought down behind him to level the kills.

The Knight's captain counter-charges into the skirmish with support

He strikes down two, as his rival only takes down one.
More fighting succumbs three more warriors.

One of the Easterlings has had enough, taking to the wind,
the rest surround the remaining knight.

Surrounded but the knight retains his composure, lancing
one of his opponents in the throat.

Despite their bravery, both Captain see no victory anymore...

And the remaining knight charges, hopefully for the last time.

The other Easterlings are too shocked by their captains departure,
allow the knight to cut through their opened guards.

Giving the Gondorians the victory!

So the Gondorians have gained another close victory. To be honest any of the three forces they faced could have come out on top quite easily. The knights had the offensive advantage, the Easterlings positioned themselves well to prevent one devastating charge, or so they thought. The hastily formed wall should have had spear support, and neither of the captains should be fleeing leaving one or two of the warriors remaining. But still, such is war:

Tower of Ecthelion = 15
The Easterlings = 9



Overall Kill standings
Suladan = 14 (14)
Easterling captain = 8 (12)
Gondorian captain = 7 (7)
Lurtz = 6 (8)
Shagrat = 3 (3)
Erkenbrand = 2 (2)
Dwarf Captain = 2 (2)
Elven Captain = 2 (2)

Based on the results from the killing chart (above) and parts of the battles, the Man of the Tournament goes to Suladan. This is not simply because of the number of kills, but that each other force had to focus on dealing with him in order to win each scenario. Théoden's host dealt with him very well, but his early kills prevented the Rohirrim from winning the battle. The Easterlings also dealt with him well, as he failed to kill enough of them to prevent an Easterling victory. Finally in the Third place battle, the uruks completely ignored him even as he massacred over half their force.

This ends another Face-off tournament, hopefully next time around in March and April, I do some more board work, doing the final two paint coats, flocking and sealing to finish the job!!
Also some actual story based scenario, maybe some Dwarves Vs Goblins, or maybe something completely different.

Until then

Fish