Game 2: vs @Cartwright’s Northern Alliance in Push
Lists:
A though centre with hard hitting heavy infantry, nimble squares to solve problems and flying shooting to put on the pressure. Looks solid and versatile.
The frostclaws have to project most of the threat though.
Individuals are important to undead, as they should be thematically, which makes the flying iceblade very concerning.
I’m running a slightly different list. More werewolves, at the expense of zombies; because werewolves are faster to paint (especially per point). These games are to get a feel for the army while I paint it and zombies are at the end of the painting queue.
I’m experimenting with heroes; I’ve kept the lykanis and the trio with inspiring and surge, added a necromancer with Ej Periscope. The inspiring necromancer is tooled up for support with heal and Veil of Shadows. The periscope necromancer is meant for mischief, with drain life and hex. Both necromancers have surge.
Deployment:
We roll up the same Epic Dwarf Map, but I choose sides this time.
I immediately wish I had some zombies to hold loot.
Th plan is to push on the right side of the map (undead’s left flank).
The buildings and obstacles make it hard to project threat form the bottom right, but units from the top can cross the middle for extra points without having to get past the second building.
I can hopefully overrun what ever tries to come through between the buildings and push my loot to safety there.
The Northerners deploy to test this plan, by stacking their frostclaws on the right.
The spread out the hearthguard makes for a challenge to deal with.
Undead Turn 1:
Most of my undead shamble up.
The lykanis moves to interfere with the frostclaws.
The NA leaning right gives my werewolves free reign to delay on the left.
Veil of shadows fails and doesn’t come up again. Hex (with periscope help) fails too.
It’s at this point that command dice come up (my opponent took a red).
There isn’t anything I would have done with one so I don’t bother for this turn, but we are using them.
Northern Alliance Turn 1:
The frostclaws move up to start putting pressure on the right and deal some good shooting damage.
The NA move up conservatively. Except the iceblade
shudders.
Undead Turn 2:
Most of the undead shamble up and the second line units on the right get on the hill.
The other werewolves also move onto a hill to delay the NA left flank.
The iceblade and hearthguard are problems. The iceblade is a threat to the individuals that I need.
The hearthguard is a threat, but I need to draw them out. If I charge them in a turn or two, but they’re still on the obstacles, they probably survive the hindered charge and destroy anything on the (unhindered) counter charge.
So the zombie trolls try to solve both, since they can’t take much more shooting anyway.
They drop the loot (which the wraiths grab), move to look at the ieblade, use 4 CP to cast drain life and then get surged into combat. The extra damage from drain life should push the iceblade to a rout and then they can invite a hindered charge from the hearth guard.
After drain life and life leech they should even survive.
Poor damage and a double one means that they will be a sacrifice instead.
The lykanis helps out by disordering the frostclaw regiment, limiting the forstclaw horde’s options. Hopefully a fight the lykanis can win, eventually, life leech and the first charge vs similar nerve stats.
Northern Alliance Turn 2:
The trolls successfully draw the hearthguard out…
They also give the frosclaw horde and way forward.
The iceblade tries to tip the balance against the lykanis, but they don’t care.
The ice queen uses the potent CP enhanced Celestial restoration to erase my first charge advantage though.
Two snow troll primes block up werewolves. One tries to shut down surge casting while they’re at it, but the Revenant King can take a hit and the prime seals their doom for this folly.
Undead Turn 3:
Both snow troll primes get shredded by werewolves with TC from their hills.
The Revenant King leaves to disorder the frostclaw horde and gets the one point of of damage.
My line engages, so that the grind can happen closer to where I score extra point with loot tokens.
The dwarfs show courage, but not like the hearthguard.
With the wraiths and a drain life helping the wights have good odds to rout the hearthguard, but I forget that the prime inspires them and roll that combat first, for a double 1 on the reroll.
You may have noticed that that’s not the necromancer with drain life and you are correct.
4 CP means that he does though, thanks to Unholy Puppets.
Northern Alliance Turn 3:
The lines grind and my line starts to unravel on the left (undead right flank). Hopefully the werewolves can stall things.
Over on the right:
The frostclaws don’t hit back very hard without TC. The iceblade remembers her purpose shudders.
The wights are in trouble, even without dwarfs charging their flank, but they are not to be outdone for courage and get a double 1 of their own.
Undead Turn 4:
The grind continues with an insanely courageous snow troll holding the line.
The werewolves nimbly shut down the celestial restoration and threaten the back of that line though.
The wraiths flank and Revenant King the hearthguard to seal their fate and let the werewolves rout the frostclaws. The werewolves get exactly what they need, so the one damage from the Revenant Kings pays off here.
The hearthguard refuse to yield, despite being devastated.
The skeleton spears with the loot are stuck though and the inspiring necromancer is facing down the iceblade.
Drain life (Unholy Puppets again) is ineffective.
Northern Alliance Turn 4:
Things do not go the undead way on the right. The dwarfs finish off the wights (getting over the centre line too).
The hearthguard use CP to regenerate (a NA command order) and shrug off being devastated; which lets them put down the Revenant King and overrun into the wraiths and take their loot.
The iceblade does her thing
shudders.
Finally, the Celestial Restoration from a few turns ago pays off as the frostclaw regiment gets a waver.
The centre goes better. The wights there hold because I don’t think that they can be triple charged (naiads must charge the skeletons).
The snow foxes make themselves very useful though.
Undead Turn 5:
Death comes to turn the tide the undead’s way. Both werewolf hordes kill their third unit, but have to stand and fight now.
The NA crumbles, meaning that I can keep the units on the left away form all the loot for the rest of the game.
The wights have all threats in their flank arcs, but skeletons flush with both flanks, so the whole line makes no reform move.
The Skeletons with the lot get technical.
They’re facing the wrong way. So they drop the loot, turn around, get surged into combat and are then still standing on their loot.
The wavered lykais purposefully exposes their flank.
The frostclaws either finish the wolf off or have them threatening flanks in turn 6.
Northern Alliance Turn 5:
The frostclaws chose to finish off the lykanis.
The werewolves on the left survive the hindered hearthguard charge, but waver. Good enough, because the hearthguard risked exposing their flank in this bid to affect the end of the game.
The cavern dweller puts on the pressure though.
The naiads can’t get over the centre line, so back up to get the wights in their front and preserve their token.
Undead Turn 6:
The wights take the flank charge, these hearthguard don’t have the insane spirit of their fellows.
Dropping the loot in a way that lets the skeleton horde cross the centre and pivot to touch it.
The werewolves on the right claim their 4th victim, getting over the centre line in the process.
Drain life fails another necromancer faced with the iceblade.
Northern Alliance Turn 6:
The NA have a last play.
The iceblade shuts down the last undead source of inspiring and the naiads go for the skeletons.
Fortunately, the undead horde are not zombies and survive to deny the Northerners a draw.
There is not a turn 7.
Giving the Undead a victory!
After game thoughts:
Very much a scenario victory, but it feels more convincing than the last!
My plan worked, despite the right becoming such an epic struggle.
Having the frostclaw regiment on the right flank instead of one unit of foxes would have made it much harder though.
Werewolves did very well this game, with 7 routs between them. It’s worth noting that they had terrific opportunities to shine though. Early charges off hills and then mopping up weak units made up for their CS (1).
Still, having something so fast and nimble is fantastic for a shambling army.
My 3 inspiring and surge choices served me well, despite getting hunted down. Having them spread out to inspire means that I game probably get two in range when I actually need surge. It’s nice that they have slightly different other capabilities.
The necromancer with periscope was not particularly effective. Drain life (4) is not very reliable and hex wasn’t needed. I think that a higher level caster would be more worthwhile for this kind of thing, so I’ll think I’ll try a Lich King instead of both necromancers. The Lich comes with inspiring, so can inspire and take the periscope.
Ideally I’d get a zombie regiment painted up instead of the second necromancer though.
Command dice were mostly spent on rerolls and faction specific orders.
They let you get a bit more out of your units in limited places and make the game move forgiving.
It feels like another (less predicable) layer of the same kind of thinking and planning as usual in KoW, though.
They’re not awful, but it feels like extra fuss for pretty much the same result. I’m not sure I care to bother.
Kind of like adding a condiment to food that I already like.
. They might survive a turn, but need the trolls to help.
