Cancon 2014 Aftermath: Part 6

This is the sixth part of my series of posts covering my time playing Warhammer at Cancon 2014. You can find the previous game here.

Well that last game had been a bit depressing. But I had new dice and things were surely looking up.

Game 6 – Battleline

Steve Goumas – Lizardmen

"Am I lion?" No man has ever loved his t-shirt more that Steve loved that one. Or at the very least, puns involving lions...

• Slann Mage Priest (Level 4, Lore of Shadow) with Soul of Stone, Wandering Deliberations, probably some other stuff
• Scar Veteran (BSB) on Cold One with stuff.
• Oldblood of choppy-ness on Cold One. Might have been another Scar Veteran – I honestly can't say. But he was scary and choppy. Of that I am certain.
• 20 Saurus Warriors with Spears, Full Command
• 25 Skinks with Javelins
• 25 Skinks with Javelins
• 20 Temple Guard with Full Command
• Stegadon
• Ancient Stegadon with Engine of the Gods

I know, it's all very vague. For what it's worth, I remember the Slann had “sould of stone” on the army list. I can remember the typo. Pity about the actual relevant details. I think one of the Stegadons had Sharpened Horns. Maybe...

At the commencement of our game, Steve also ran off and bought new dice when he discovered where they were available. Apparently his luck had been questionable at best, as well. So, both armed with new dice and new confidence, we got things rolling.

As you would expect with such a list, Steve put all the Saurus characters and the Slann in with the Temple Guard. His vast units of Skinks were on the flanks, and I figured they would be easily dealt with. I got the first turn and pushed forward pretty aggressively, although only the Demigryphs on the flank really pushed further forward than the Flagellants. I think I knocked a few wounds off the Stegadon with an irresistible Banishment from the War Altar.

My forces move forward as Steve and his lion t-shirt look on.

Another shot along the lines. It's a very Warhammer Fantasy building that one, eh? Scrapyard and all...

Steve moved the Skinks on my right up and blocked the advance of the Demigryphs. They shot a wound off my unit, but that was OK. The other Skink unit stayed more or less where it was in the forest on the other side of the line. I confess, I kind of forgot they would be steadfast in there. I was tired and maybe my head wasn't really in the game.

Rather predictably, the Demigryphs find their advance blocked by Skinks.

This theory is backed up by my next action, when my Inner Circle Knights charged straight into the Stegadon Ancient. For some reason this seemed a good idea to me. I think I got off Speed of Light on the unit, but realistically that was never going to be enough to punch through something so tough and stubborn. Maybe I was planning on casting Wyssan's Wildform. Whatever my thinking was, it was silly. I did a few wounds, and ground to a halt. My delusions of punching through and getting into the enemy's back-line were shattered, and the Temple Guard with about a billion high strength attacks could see my flank.

Look, no brains! Whatever possessed me to make a charge where I would almost certainly be bogged with my flank exposed, I can't say.  It's possible my unit would have held or at least dragged the Temple Guard into the Saurus with their flank exposed, but I don't think I had thought it through that carefully.

Look, Skinks! Easy victims...

Elsewhere things went a bit better. The Demigryphs charged the Skinks and killed more than half of them, but let them get away in order to reform to threaten the flank of the Saurus block. The small Knight unit on my other flank charged the Skinks in the forest, and then remembered that they were more than likely going to hold their ground. In fact, the Skinks basically fought my guys to a standstill for a few rounds and killed a couple of my Knights before my unit eventually lost the combat and broke instead...

That's right, be off with yer!

Some time later: Well that was embarrassing...

As foolish as my charge of the Stegadon Ancient was (my only hope was it would put his Temple Guard out of position and ready to be flank charged by my army), I was mightily relieved when Steve decided not to charge the flank of my Inner Circle Knights, and instead sent the unit, along with the unengaged Stegadon, into the Flagellants who had taken up position behind a wall. That was much, much better. Things further improved when the Temple Guard then managed to stuff up their charge roll! They were so close, I hadn't even considered that as a possibility. What a bonus! The Stegadon went in alone, and didn't last long in the face of the Flagellants' fury.

The Stegadon finds itself in a losing battle.

The Slann and his friends look on, pretending not to have contributed to the Stegadon's situation in any way, shape or form.

In a good display of aggression, Steve also charged his Saurus block into my other unit of Flagellants. And when I say good, I really mean it was a big mistake and awesome for me. I think he underestimated just how terrifying the Flagellants could be – especially with the Hurricanum nearby. The carnage was considerable – I think I killed 13 Saurus before they got to attack. This was rather disheartening for the Lizardmen, and they fled and were run down for their efforts.

Are you sure you want to do this? Did we mention the doom?

At this point the details get a bit sketchy, because I forgot to take photos for a while. I think I finally got the Stegadon Ancient when the Flagellants sauntered up after finishing off the Saurus, and charged into the flank. I'm pretty sure the Skinks on my left shot the remainder of my small Knight unit to death rather than charging them, but then eventually my other Flagellant unit caught up with them and they died spectacularly in a single round.

My Demigryphs didn't make much more of a contribution. I think they were in the wrong position to flank the Stegadon Ancient, and by the time they had corrected this, the Skinks were back and in their way again. I had to charge them but barely clipped them, and rolled so badly that I think I lost combat in the first round, but thankfully held. Then I corrected the situation with a combat reform and the Skinks died.

In the centre things didn't go as well. I fled the charge of the Temple Guard with something (maybe the Hurricanum) and Steve redirected into the War Altar. He needed an 8 or so, and I was actually going to flee but somehow missed my chance as things got a bit garbled. I lost the Arch Lector to one of the Saurus characters of doom, but the War Altar managed to flee through a building (no doubt making its own chariot-sized doors as it went), then rallied on the other side on leadership 5. So that was a good outcome for me.

As vague as some of this is, I do remember the end of the game. The Slann turned his unit around and took aim at the Demigryphs. With an apocalyptic boosted Searing Doom, he reduced by unit to a single singed Demigryph with a single wound remaining. Poor doggies!

This did not satisfy Lord Froggie however, and he unleashed the power of Spirit Leech upon the survivor. With total power. Egad. A flurry of dice rolls starting coming from Steve before anyone could stop him (there were half a dozen people watching by this point, as we were running late), and he rolled a 3 on the miscast table. That was very bad, as even his Soul of Stone wasn't going to save him from the Dimensional Cascade result. At this point I managed to pull him up and explained that you resolve the effects of the spell before rolling on the miscast table, so we went back. The Demigryph was duly smashed in the roll-off and the Slann was somewhat satisfied as he claimed their valuable victory points. Then Steve rolled again on the miscast table. Another 3. What the hell? So once again, his Soul of Stone would not help him. Something like 8 Temple Guard were vaporised in the resulting explosion, and then Steve rolled the 4+ to keep his Slann alive... and failed.

Once were doggies. But no more.

The Slann culls his own unit before vanishing in an impressive explosion. Silly frog.

So with the last act of the game, Steve had managed to find a way to force-feed me about 500 victory points with his suicidal frog. There was not much that could be done about it, and I have to question whether his new dice had done him any favours at all...

Result: 13-7

Looking back at it, I'm not sure I am remembering things clearly. I think I had killed everything but the Temple Guard and the Saurus characters, but don't really remember losing anything beyond the small Knight unit and the Demigryphs. 13-7 doesn't sound like an accurate reflection of that, so either I am remembering the score wrong, or we calculated it wrong, or I have gotten the details of what happened wrong. No doubt something is not right. Anyway, I won and that was nice. Even if Steve's Slann was clearly working for me...