With a free weekend, my friend Matt came up for a game of good 'ol Warhammer 6th Edition. His High Elves versus, for a change, my Dogs of War (which I had just rescued from the attic). Unfortunately it seemed my whole army suffered from 'newly painted' syndrome (they're not newly painted, but this is only about their second outing on the table). A combination of stupid mistakes on my part, good tactics on Matt's, and some truly awful dice rolls resulted in disaster!
My army was heavy on the infantry, with quite a few Regiments of Renown. Matt's had quite a few small blocks of spear elves but, more worryingly, a lot of chariots (I hate chariots, as will become clear!).
Pikemen, Heavy Cavalry, Ricco's Republican Guard
The full battle line, light cavalry at the rear
Braganza's Besiegers and Halfling Hotpot! (Ogres just out of sight beyond)
Marksman of Miragliano. Paymaster and bodyguard to rear
Opening moves from Matt
Elves at the pub!
We rolled up the 'meeting enagement' scenario. This is where my first mistake came in. Because of where I had put them in the list, my General (in the pike block) and Paymaster weren't close enough to provide mutual support, particularly re-rolls for break tests (as the paymaster acts like an army standard).
My second big mistake came when I moved my duellists, armed with pistols, out of the woods to attack an advancing unit of spear elves. I forgot that you can't move a full 8" and still shoot (in my defence, my Empire Pistoliers can, so that was a bad bit of 'muscle memory' at work). Left stranded, they were then charged by the elves, fled, but rolled utterly appallingly on their flee roll. This was to become a theme...
My centre totally collapsed shortly after, largely a result of chariot strikes, resulting in the loss of my general, heavy cavalry and pike block. With the Paymaster too far away, I didn't benefit from any re-rolls. Ricco's Republican Guard lasted longer, but only slightly longer - despite rolling 20 dice for the pikes, plus 3 attacks for Ricco, I just could not land enough hits. Matt had no such problem, and my rolling for break tests was terrible!
Matt also passed two fear tests to charge the ogres, who also couldn't hit anything and also failed their break test and ran!
Things were now looking very dodgy. All I had left were Braganza's Besiegers, a hotpot, and the light cavalry on the left; and the Marksmen of Miragliano and Paymaster's bodyguard on the right.
In the circumstances, they didn't do too bad. Two units of spear elves were routed, a cauldron landed square on a chariot, Braganza's Besiegers managed to win a combat, and the Marksmen of Miragliano came off best in an archery duel with Elf bowmen (having already destroyed a unit of spears). The light cavalry however lost a combat they shouldn't have lost and (guess what?) failed a break test and then got run down due to a terrible flee roll...
Shockingly, I won a round of combat here!
But the writing was not only on the wall by this point, it was also on the ceiling, floor, and every door and window. The left wing inevitably crumbled - although war machine crews can't normally charge, we decided to let the halflings go out in a blaze of glory, charging a chariot in the flank with cleavers and spoons. The result was inevitable...
All they needed was to cause one wound! They didn't...
But some measure of glory was retained on the right, by the Paymaster's Bodyguard, who fought on for round after round, seeing off a chariot, and holding back two units of spears, until finally the Paymaster fell and, losing their 'Stubborn' attribute, the survivors decided to hotfoot it off the battlefield.
Feeling surrounded
Look! The Chariot's gone!
Moments later, the Paymaster bit the dust and it was all over
Well, that didn't go too well did it! Would I take the DoW again after that? Yes, I would. Some of the problems were entirely down to me, like getting my duellists killed, and separating the general and paymaster. But even with my terrible dice rolling, the Regiments of Renown were good - the fact they have a pretty tough character in each unit makes them pretty survivable compared to normal units in combat. I think Matt was a bit shocked to be on the receiving end of BS4 crossbow bolts, and I like the 3+ save with the besiegers. I think I would either drop the heavy cavalry though, or take a smaller unit of Vollands Venators, to get the character.
It did also remind me I hate High Elf chariots. I don't think it's just sour grapes, and I have to give credit to Matt for how well he uses them (combining them with a spear unit that charges shortly after), but they're tough (T5), dominate the table with a 10" charge, their impact hits occur before the pikes can strike (which seems...odd), and they're quite cheap for all that. OK, their impact hits can be very variable (D6), but if they roll high they are devastating to infantry.
It also got me thinking about one of the changes that has been suggested for the Old World. The possible return of pushbacks from 2nd/3rd edition. The current rules are tough on Ld 7 armies, as any break test will always be at 6 or less. That one point shift down from the average on 2D6 of a '7', immediately pushes you immediately from 'slightly more likely to pass than not' to 'more than likely to fail'. Interested to see how that might change.
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