This week at my local club, Livingston Battleground, there
was an epic 6-way massed battle between the Empire, Bretonnians and Dwarf forces facing
off the Daemon Chaos hoards!
With the simplified Age
of Sigma rules such a large scale battle has now become easily feasible
over a morning's club session.
With no points system in Age of Sigmar it was great to
see our players enthusiastically using the opportunity to simply deploy the units they fancied. No
hours of compiling detailed rosters pre-battle and inevitably being forced to decide which of your units to
leave behind.
The only restriction on how many units we could use was
the available deployment space on the battlefield! It was so liberating. With
my big box of Empire units, out came the Steam Tank, Great Cannon and Mortar! Lets bring out the heavy cavalry units
too...oh wait...those Hand-gunners are cool, lets chuck those on too. All of em'.
And so it went on!
With my Empire army being flanked by the heavy cavalry of
the allied Bretonnians and the solid gun-lines of the Dwarfs, we diced
off to see which of the Chaos armies we'd each be facing on our 4'x4' section of the battlefield, and we were
off!
The monstrous Chaos Daemon lines forming up |
With the Chaos Daemons quickly marshaling before my
Empire troops, I must say I was a wee bit intimated to see the varied and monstrous
creatures forming up! I was so glad I had my heavy hitters with me, with the
multiple guns of the Empire Steam Tank
giving me a flicker of hope as the huge and menacing Soul Grinder leered down at it!
The plan was to theoretically play three separate engagements
on the same battlefield, the forces of Man
and Dwarf against the supernatural Chaos. Initially we allowed for allied
units to help each other out by attacking enemy units in adjacent battlefield sections,
but this started to unravel when the turn sequences between the various paired opponents
became out-of step, so we house ruled on the fly to curtail this option.
Bretonnian cavalry |
Allied support could easily be accommodated in future
large-scale battles though, with some custom rulings, for example allowing a
single nominated unit the ability to support an adjacent army. If total interaction
between the armies is required then the turn sequences would have to be synchronised
across all the armies.
Empire Mortar position (foreground), Knights and Swordsmen |
Now, I'm not that familiar with the various Chaos
creatures, and it wasn't helped by my allied Dwarvern commander dryly
suggesting the "The Empire face the
worst of the hoard, laddie". Bloody Dwarfs! All I knew was that those supernatural
creatures would be using all sorts of warped abilities! And so they did. They
were re-spawning all over the place!
Within a couple for turns the armies were fully engaged,
with the Empire and Dwarvern gun lines blasting away, the canons and mortars lobbing
shells and the Bretonnian heavy cavalry charging into the Hoards on my right
flank.
The Empire Steam Tank ("Fire everything!") faces the Daemon Soul Grinder |
I really can't give you a full report of the whole battle,
as I was too busy trying to hold the centre of the line to be watching my allied
commanders! Suffice to say even with the Chaos spawning yet more units where
their predecessors had been wiped out, the Empire lads proved to be surprisingly
firm.
The Steam tank in particular deserves a mention in dispatches for going wheel-to-claw against the towering Daemon Soul Grinder and eventually taking it down with little damage!
The Steam tank in particular deserves a mention in dispatches for going wheel-to-claw against the towering Daemon Soul Grinder and eventually taking it down with little damage!
Bretonnians battling the Daemons! |
On my left flank the Dwarfs were using their standard practise of standing firm
in line and letting the Chaos creatures come to them through devastating
Dwarvern fire. The Dwarfs soon had the upper hand and I'm sure I could hear
the Dwarvern Long beards boasting and calling for the ale barrels to be opened quite
early on!
The Dwarf lines |
Over on my right flank the massed Bretonnian heavy
cavalry appeared to be involved in a brutal melee with the Chaos forces, having
charged the enemy. It was really quite impressive!
Bretonnians! Charge! |
A couple of hours later, with numerous rounds of moving, charging,
shooting and melee by way of mass dice rolls, the last reaming two armies on
the battlefield were my Empire and the centre Chaos army. We fought it out for
a few more turns with numerous charges and counter-charges, the Empire's
mounted Battle Wizard even surprisingly managing to loose at least one effective
Chain Lightening spell.
The Empire forces |
When time was called, the Empire had lost two complete
units, with the Great Cannon crew being lost quite early on after firing only one
shot, followed by the Empire Knights after a hard-fought war of attrition with The Herald of Tzeentch on Burning Chariot.
The Chaos enemy had lost three units, including
the Soul Grinder. Somehow, the Empire had won their battle!
Overall, the Human-Dwarf allied armies claimed combined victory.
Just. It was a very close fought battle!
This was a hugely fun game. The Age of Sigmar rules lent themselves to such a massed battle game having
stripped out much of the unit rules from the previous Warhammer fantasy rule
sets in favour of speed and simplicity. And it worked! A great way to spend a Saturday morning,
commanding your troops in a massed battle against the Daemon Chaos hoards!
Wow! That looks and sounds truly epic!
ReplyDeleteThanks Gordon. A perfect excuse for the guys to dust off all their old WHF miniatures!
ReplyDeleteI've heard such mixed views about Age of Sigmar but I have to say it sounds good to me...simpler rules and much more flexible rules which can easily do big battles as well as small skirmishes. I just don't have the figures for big battle Warhammer but Age of Sigmar has changed that...if I can do Dragon Rampant I can do Age of Sigmar!
DeleteNice looking game, pictures and amries are really impressive!
ReplyDeleteThanks Phil. It was just an excuse for our old armies to get an airing. Mine hadn't been out for a couple of years and quite literally had to be dusted off. I'd forgot how much I had. About a third was still left in the box! Ironically, Age of Sigmar has inspired me to get the Warhammer Fantasy 7th edition out again.
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