Kings of War 3rd Edition: #083 Herd vs Dwarfs in Kill

Intro and Lists

This weekend saw Jeff Schiltgen visit Wisconsin to assert some dominance. Yours truly missed the sign-up for the beatings games, but that is probably for the best given my haphazard approach to the game, and my insistence to try new things rather than fine tune the same list or even the same army for months and months. Aside from getting to know folks and evangelize a bit, there were a lot of list discussions, and Jeff was generous offering feedback and suggestions. Very commendable, but when I am throwing stuff against the wall to see what sticks... not a great use of his time. While I wasn't playing him, there was a sort-of meetup going at the shop, and I ventured out early to scavenge for games, and was fortunate enough to get two in on the day.

Speaking of folks that fine tune things, the first game was against our friend Joe, and his implacable Imperial Dwarfs! It helps to play a popular army, but Joe has voraciously consumed content and diligently iterated on his lists to get his sturdy dwarfs to where he wants them to be. His list was called the End Game, as this is the culmination of the escalation league for Wisconsin.

As should be expected, the dwarfs are sturdy, with 4.91 for their average defense, and with all the regimental spam, his current list is  staggering 17 drops and 33 unit strength. We have a lot of Ironguard, a lot of Mastiff Packs, some Shield Guard, the ever-present formation, the mean dwarf Faber, a Flame Priest for Fireball, a Stone Priest for Bane Chant, nearly a dozen throwing Mastiffs, and lastly Brock Riders for some reach. It's a nasty list if it can sit back and do what it wants to do.

I brought the Herd. I was looking to switch it up, but it was a remarkably busy week, and I couldn't quite get anything else in a spot to test out. Plus, most of this was packed already, since I didn't have the time to really unpack and reset after my previous games.

As-ever, the Herd struggles with grinding fights, Phalanx, obstacles, and high defense. And we could probably add shooting of all kinds to that list of deficiencies, given the generally low defense of the army. I've been experimenting with Greater Earth Elementals as well as Tree Herders to cover some of these shortcomings, but the lists of late have gotten rather elite. The Herd wants to be aggressive, but that is hard to do when you get out deployed! So, we are trying some new things. Up to test are:

• Tribal Spears with items. The Tribal Spear Hordes have been bright spots in the roster, and are basically staples in my Herd lists these days. Thunderous Charge lets them play offense a bit, and the hordes hold items well. Points were tight, so just a few items to hopefully keep them in fights a little longer.
• Guardian Brutes. These have also been staples. Like the Spears, these units have 30 attacks, and working together, tossing around lots of decent dice has worked alright. 
• Druid. Maintaining Inspiring coverage while getting some variety and utility from the sources has been a concern in my lists, but the meager Druid is a nice source of repeatable Inspiring and Bane Chant, and has been nice to have around.
• Double Tree Herder. The Tree Herders can do a lot for the Herd, but are expensive enough that I need to build my list around them. 
• Gladewalker with AC. When coming up with a list idea, I usually have an idea, and then come up with one or two variations on it to compare and contrast between the games. I wanted to explore the Gladewalker and some of the unique magic spells, and picked the Alchemist Curse as a variant, in case I played Joe, knowing he hadn't really come across the spell yet. I don't like to tailor my lists, so game him the option to play against it or not, and he opted in.
• Harpies. The Gur Panthers are great chaff, but 5 points more gets you flying chaff, so they seem worth the extra investment most of the time. I had been bringing just one troop, but with a wide and aggressive line, I definitely need more. 
• Trapper Troops. Neither the regiments nor the Silent Hunt formation have really worked our for me, as the units are too difficult to use. Seeing they are 90 points for a troop (equal to a Harpy), I figured I'd see how they did as roadblock chaff. They also scout, so might play well with the Tree Herder. We'll see how they do.
• Centaur Strider Troops. I liked reactive Longhorn troops, but felt like the Centaurs would be better. They aren't nimble, but have a greater speed to zone out fliers or reposition just a little quicker. Additionally, they are Height 3, so might be able to block for the Guardian Brutes and such. We'll see how they do too.

I quite liked having some reserve troops in previous games as ways to adapt to things without overreacting, and wanted to pursue that more in these games. Essentially, the troops are being taken to increase my drop count, and going to be looking to block charges and sacrifice themselves to protect the big units (Tree Herder, Guardian Brutes, Spear Hordes), with the thinking being that if these can survive to the late game, I should have a better chance of doing something to help me win.

Table and Terrain

We were out at the splendid Oddwillows shop, and since we were showing up earlier and aiming to start before Jeff's queue got going, we brought terrain and stuff for a few more tables. When we arrived, Jeff was already battling, so we set up the two other tables we had reserved for the club, and then got to playing on the dwarf's home turf.

We were using our typical terrain rules, running the buildings and big physical skull rock as Height 9 blocking terrain, the forests as Height 6 Difficult Terrain, the long fences as Height 2 Obstacles, and the Hills as Height 3. We had no ponds or shorter difficult terrain for the Herd to utilize.

To make things even more difficult for the Herd, we rolled up Kill for the scenario.

The dwarfs kicked us off for deployment. I thought stacking the Bulwarks with Phalanx early on was a mistake until the rest of the army arrived. Given the table, scenario, and the match-up, the Imperial Dwarfs happily castled in the corner...

The dwarven castle is quite formidable.

There's not really a concise way to cover the deployment. Essentially, we have a front line of Bulwarks, the horde of Ironclad, Ironguard, Ironguard and Berserker Riders. Heroes and hounds were a second line, with Shieldbreakers and Faber in reserve. The Flame Priest is in red, and the Stone Priest is in Green. Hansel, the ASB, is nestled in between the Bulwarks. 

The Herd's left.

The Herd had deployed centrally, looking to avoid the lengthy obstacles. Left to right we have Trappers, the Spears with the Brew of Sharpness with Harpies in reserve, a Tree Herder, Guardian Brutes with Centaur Striders in reserve, Trappers blocking for the Tribal Spears with the Chalice of Wrath and the BC Druid, then the other Tree Herder, Guardian Brutes with more supporting Centaur Striders, and then Harpies and the Alchemist Curse Gladestalker. Lastly, out on the flank I had another Trapper unit as an early drop. 

The Herd's right.

I didn't want to mess with the obstacles. They hope was to charge through the center and maybe win? Given the scenario, table, and match-up... this was going to be a very tough fight for me no matter the angle of attack. On the bright side, this would be a great test of my ablative troop approach! So that's the focus. Just test units and distances and see what I could learn. I had Scout moves, and remembered them all, making this a good step in that direction. 

Scout moves on the right.

On the right, the Trappers move up to get their leader point into the woods, in order to see out of it. Given the threat range of the Berserker Brocks, I wasn't too eager to move the unit up.

Scout moves, back on the left.

The Trappers on the far left go up 9-10 inches. The intent is to pivot and move them up around the building. With Range 18, they aren't going to be shooting at anything anytime soon. The left Tree Herder is safe, so he races up 12 inches, along with the other Trappers, who might be able to draw out some Throwing Mastiffs. The second Tree Herder moves up 7 inches or so, staying out of Mastiff range. 

I win the roll off for turn order, and opt to go first. I'm the Herd, and have nothing to really threaten him at range, so I kinda feel like just getting down to it. 

Top of Round 1: Herd

We are aggressive! I donked things up with the Harpies a bit, moving them early, and preventing the Trappers on the left from moving at the double. With no tokens or things to contest, they are here to block and die, and I could have kept these in reserve for another turn. A small error from me.

The Herd goes up!

So the Trappers stay put, the Harpies fly up, the Tribal Spears advance 12", and the Tree Herder moves and pivots. The Brutes move up, with the Centaurs behind them, and the other Spear Horde moves up as well. The screening Trapper moves and pivots to start threatening stuff already. The second Tree Herder holds, wary of all the Throwing Mastiffs nearby. Given his height, everything can see him, and that could be very bad for me to lose him to dogs. The Centaur Striders take the hill, blocking line of sight to the Guardian Brutes and threatening some long charges. The Alchemist Curse Gladewalker Druid posts up by the building, out of range of the dogs too. The Harpies fly up, protected by the building, but ready to fly out and die as needed. The Trappers on the right stay put. 

The central Trappers moved, so have a penalty for shooting, and no shots pierce the Dwarf armor.

Bottom of Round 1: Dwarfs

As-predicted, many a mastiff are thrown!

The first mastiffs fly through the air.

Two dogs go into the Trappers, landing 3 damage and get a bit of a lucky waver. Three dogs, plus a nasty Fireball go into the Centaur Striders, bringing them up to 11 damage and routing them.

The overview.

The rest of the Dwarf line shuffles around, waiting for the Herd to arrive. 

Top of Round 2: Herd

On the right, the Trappers move at the double. The Brock Riders should easily best them nest turn, but given their positioning, the charge will be hindered by the obstacle. Hopefully we can gum this scary unit up for a while. 

Opening charges for the Herd.

The Guardian Brutes charge off the hill into the horde of Ironclad. I have Def4 on the Brutes, so I should hopefully negate the Horde and their Hammer of Measured Force. They catch a Bane Chant, and I roll pretty good, and land 14 damage against the horde, but they shrug it off.

The nearest unit of Ironguard have a flank charge into them, so I send the Harpies up to slow them down. The AC Gladewalker Druid sneaks up, and lands 5 damage into the nearest unit of Ironguard.

The Tree Herder charges the Bulwarks, knocking the spears aside and landing 5 damage.

The other Tree Herder moves at the double to close in, and the Harpies fly up to interdict. I don't remember what the thinking here was. Only the Bulwarks should be able to reach him with charges, but he's tall so the throwers of dogs can definitely see the looming tree.

The rest of the Herd's line moves up.

Bottom of Round 2: Dwarfs

Usually once the Guardian Brutes make it into a combat, they are relatively safe. Not here though. I am height 3, all the Dwarfs are height 2, and the horde disengages. Five throwing Mastiffs, the nasty Fireball and Faber all shoot into them, bringing the horde up to 17, and obliterating them. 

The Dwarfs start their push forward.

The Brock Riders make their hindered charge into the Trappers, and look to overrun. They roll 1" and are stuck up on the obstacle.

Centrally, the Bulwarks land 3 into the Tree Herder, which is pretty good. 

Reforms for the Dwarfs.

On the left, the Bulwarks charge the Harpies. I think I put them there to slow the Dwarfs down on any overruns to left the rest of my left flank move next turn? That is all I can think of. The Dwarfs prevail, and change facing slightly.

Top of Round 3: Herd

The Herd make more charges. Some of them are even good charges!

On the left, the Tree Herder charges the Bulwarks and is joined by the Guardian Brutes. Hindered, the Brutes deal their expected 7 damage, and the Tree Herder contributes... nothing. They hold with a low check.

Centrally, the Brutes and their tray prevents the Trappers from joining the other Tree Herder in that fight against the Bulwarks. He counter charges, landing another 3 damage (5 expected), bringing them to 8 damage, but they hold with a low check.

The Alchemist Curse Gladewalker Druid tosses into the same Ironguard unit, rolling amazing for hits but garbage for damage with a lot of 1's on the pips. Three damage goes through, bringing them to 8 damage, which is about where we should be after two casts. I do get a waver out of this though. 

Combats and reforms.

A the Tribal Spears with the Chalice charge the Ironclad horde, catch a Bane Chant, and deal 11 damage (10 expected), and the horde is finished off. I do some measurements trying to figure out what to do for reforms. The nearby Ironguard (wavered by the AC spellcaster) do have a flank charge, and the further Ironclad are out of arc. The Mastiffs were flush with the Ironclad horde, which was a little ahead of the Ironguard. I cannot get even with the nearer Ironguard on an overrun to avoid that flank, since I need to keep the inch distance from the Mastiffs

I pivot them slightly to get the nearest unit into the front arc. This is an error. In retrospect, I feel like I should have overrun. Everything is messy, and the Mastiffs won't have the angles to get away, and while the Dwarfs have Headstrong, the Spears would be safer with the overrun.

Bottom of Round 3: Dwarfs

I didn't check, and my pivot allows the other unit of Ironguard to spy the last few millimeters of my horde, and thus make a flank charge. The other unit passes their Headstrong check (it feels like Joe hasn't failed one of these against me yet!), catches a Bane Chant, and a group of Mastiffs charges in too. The horde is taken to 16 damage, and routed. This is my fault, and was entirely avoidable.

A costly mistake for the Herd.

With the fighting on this side of the table, the Brocks pivot and move along the obstacle trying to outride the Dwarf line.

The Flame Priest hops up and lands 4 into the AC Gladewalker Druid, but she holds strong.

The Bulwarks and Faber charge my other Guardian Brutes. A combined six damage is done, but with 12 and 11 on the dice for the Nerve check, the Brutes are picked up regardless, and neither horde really achieved anything for me this game.

Top of Round 4: Herd

Things are jammed up. With the Spear Horde gone, the AC Gladewalker Druid is exposed. I don't think it's worth hopping her up as sacrifice to try and take out the original Ironclad Regiment, so I back up, out of Mastiff Charge range, and toss into the other regiment, landing just 2 damage. Sheesh.

The Herd is stalling out.

The Trappers can't really fit anywhere, so they pivot and move to prevent flank charges into the Tree Herder, who charges back into the Bulwarks, continuing the brawl from Round 2. The Herder brings it back a bit, landing 6 damage this turn, and finally secures the rout.

On the left, I want to try and gum up the Mastiffs. The Trappers go in, land 5 damage, and do thankfully secure a waver. The dogs have really good nerve as it turns out.

The Herd finally breaks the Bulwarks.

The remaining Centaurs hit the flank of the other Bulwarks, bypassing their Phalanx. They deal 4 damage (5+ expected), and the Herder contributes a pitiful 2 damage (5 expected). Still, they are brought to 13, and routed, brining this combat co a close as well. The Centaurs back up, and the Tree Herder changes facing.

The Tribal Spears with the Brew charge Faber, catching a Bane Chant. They deal 6 to the legendary lord (10 expected), and being Fearless, Faber easily hangs around.

Bottom of Round 4: Dwarfs

Having pretty thoroughly blunted the Herd onslaught, the Dwarfs start to push back with more force.

The Wavered Mastiffs do nothing, and the Shieldbreakers are held up. Another Mastiff unit runs up to deny a Tree Herder a flank charge into those Shieldbreakers milling about.

Charges and moves for the Dwarfs.

Faber counter-charges the Spears, landing 5 damage with he mech weapons.

More Mastiffs charge the Tree Herder, sneaking 2 damage in.

The Ironclad multi-charge the Trappers, take them to 20 damage, and will devastate and rout them, as is proper. Both will spin to face the flank of my last horde of Spears.

Combats for the Dwarfs.

The Flame Priest will land 2 on the AC Gladewalker, taking her to 6 and does gets a waver.

The Brock Riders will finally untangle themselves from the obstacle, eyeing what remains of the Herd's battle line.

Top of Round 5: Herd

The Herd is spinning out a bit. The wavering Gladewalker will inch back, getting mostly off the hill.

The Trappers will charge the wavering Mastiffs again, this time joined by the Centaur Striders. The will best the unit, with the Trappers making an overrun and the Centaurs backing up.

The Tribal Spears catch another Bane Chant, and counter-charge Faber, while getting a little Radiance of Life. We deal 4 damage (6 expected). With average dice, Faber would be devastated. With my dice, he is just at 9, and sticks around again, making great use of Fearless.

Combats for the Herd, such as they are.

The Tree Herder gets 1 back from Radiance of Life, lands a few damage into the Mastiffs, and they break. Unfortunately, with the 1" buffer, I can't overrun to get the Tree Herder out of the arc of the Shield Breakers. With the Spears failing, I can't back up to make this a front charge. In short, I can't do much, so I pivot to prevent some of the Ironguard from getting a flank charge too.

Bottom of Round 5: Dwarfs

On the left/top, the Shieldbreakers charge the Trappers and ravage them.

The Mastiffs paw ineffectually at the Tree Herder, but things are so gummed up, he's got no where else he can get to.

Fabers lands 3 on the Spears, bringing them to 7 damage.

Moves for the Dwarfs.

The Center is messy. Hansel the ASB and the Stone Priest hop to to prevent some shuffles, allowing the Shieldbreakers into the Flank and the Ironguard into the front of the Tree Herder. The Breakers land 21 hits and make this 11 damage into the Herder, with 1 from the front, and at 12 damage, the Herder falls!

In a small miracle, the blocking heroes from the Dwarfs help prevent the other Ironguard unit from flank charging my Tribal Spears, as they needed a pivot to get around the other unit. They instead just shuffle down, ready to make their move next turn.

The first Tree Herder falls.

The Mastiffs take the hill to threaten the Gladewalker Druid, and the Brock Riders pull up to see if them can help in the late game.

The Flame Priest tucks in behind my Tribal Spear horde, but doesn't have the inches to target the Gladewalker. He lands 2 on the normal Druid, and gets a Waver there instead...

Top of Round 6: Herd

I am stuck in a bunch of bad combats, with a large contingent of Dwarfs still eager to fight.

The Centaurs join the Tree Herder against the Mastiffs, and best the dogs. The reform to protect the Tree Herder, and the Tree Herder backs up to prevent a flank charge from the Shieldbreakers.

With the Druid Wavered, the Tribal Spears can't get a Bane Chant, but do land another 4 against Faber, (3.3 expected), and finally do see him off. All the individuals prevent decent reforms. In the last round, a lot of Dwarfs got closer than an inch to my remaining units, so yeah, it's messy. I might need to bring a 1" game aid around to prevent that in the future.

With the Mastiffs advancing so far, the Alchemist Curse Gladewalker slips away, and lands another 4 into the original unit, brining them to just 12 damage, but I still get the rout here.

Bottom of Round 6: Dwarfs

It's Kill, and the Dwarfs move in to make good on the scenario. 

The Flame Priest moves back to scorch the Gladewalker Druid away.

The Centaur Striders get flanked by Shieldbreakers and fronted by Ironguard, and broken.

Just the Tree Herder remains.

The Herder is untouched, but the Tribal Spear horde gets a frontal from the Shieldbreakers, a flank by the Ironguard, and a flank by the Brock Riders, who catch a bane chant. The unit needs Insane Courage before we even get to rolling for the Brocks. 

And that's it for the game. We didn't tally points, as the winner is obvious, with the Imperial Dwarfs weathering the onslaught and pushing back in quite the fluffy fashion!

Game Conclusion

The ablative wounds worked nicely, eating most of the Mastiff tosses. Had this been the second or third game of mine with that approach, I probably could have realized I could be more patient. Going into the game, given the match-up, table, and scenario, I didn't really think I had a prayer, but in hindsight and in writing the report, I definitely could have been much more cagey. I bemoaned my army's own lack of ranged options here, but the only long-range shots from the Dwarfs would have been from Faber himself, and I probably could have weathered that for few turns in order to set up a stronger push against the dwarf castle in the corner. Not my best showing, but I'd say we still learned a lot!

Testing Conclusion

• Tribal Spears with items. These weren't used particularly well, but are still a pretty great unit for the Herd. 
• Guardian Brutes. Usually, if I can get them into combat, things go relatively well for them, and they at least trade for something. They didn’t have great luck here. I wasn’t going to break the horde, but I totally forgot disengaging and more dogs was an option (good move there from my opponent), and hot dice to rout the other unit meant neither actually did much this game, and against high Defense, that’s creates a bit of a problem, especially with the Kill scenario!
• Druid with BC. I didn't have the points for Conjurer's Staff, but she still got the spell off pretty reliably, and contributed. As-is the usual with her, it's fine, but nothing ground-breaking.
• Double Tree Herder. I remembered both Scout moves for them, so that's a start. They didn't have much luck with the dice this game though, and I didn't support them very well either.
• Gladewalker with AC. This was more of a test for the benefit of the Dwarfs. My take going into the game was that the spell is nice, but not a hard-counter to defensive play, since I still need to cast the spell and am only dealing an expected 4 damage a turn at best. I didn’t have anything like a Steel Behemoth to try and trade up into, and while I did some damage during the game, I struggled to pick things up and reduce the fighting power of the dwarfs early enough to matter. Pairing this was artillery fire or mass Lightning Bolts would be more effective, obviously, but not something the Herd can do.
• Trapper Troops. For their first outing, they did ok? The bows can't do much, but a scouting chaff piece with Pathfinder looks like a fun tool. I like them enough to explore them a bit more, and they are already in my second list for the day, so we'll see what else we can learn.
• Harpies. With so much height 2, it seemed hard to get any other use out of them besides dying chaff. In retrospect, with the ablative troop approach working ok, I should have preserved these a bit more, and charged them in to allow the big stuff to move up. Not amazing uses of them here, but hopefully some lessons learned for the future!
• Centaur Strider Troops. These break up my charge range nicely, adding a few extra inches of threat, even if they aren’t the scariest unit. This game was a great test for them, and they were indeed able to block for the Guardian Brutes on the hill, and escort that horde into the enemy lines. Not a bad utility troop!

Joe has been diligently learning his army and it shows. While he had a strong hand going into the game, the victory is still his. He wisely played to his strengths, watched his angles, and secured the win in another fluffy victory for his army. Thanks for the game!