Thoughts on the Provincial Loot Battle

On Loot…

My opponent had already unpacked all his models on one side of the table before we rolled “Loot” up, so most of the objectives ended up being placed near the middle, in an effort to be gentlemanly. I think we both approached this as “fight for a few turns” and then use whatever is left to claim objectives in the last few turns… there is definitely a lot of room for strategic improvement on my part here, but that will come with more experience with the scenario and increased familiarity with my list.

On the game…

I think we both played a good game, each with our own ups and downs.

I think I was too aggressive with my left flank to begin with. I should have stayed in my deployment zone. I was hoping his speedy cavalry would advance ahead of his infantry, and I could pick each apart in turn. However, by moving my left flank forward... it allowed his forces to arrive all at once, which caused some trouble for me.

Additionally, I think I could have deployed a little better on the left. I think putting my Foot Guard at the table edge (instead of the chaffy Pole Arms) would have made for a better anchor for that section of my lines. Minor, but minor things add up.

In the center, I think I should have used my Foot Guard Troop more conservatively; deployed with and supporting the left flank, for instance, instead of brazenly trying to take the center all by themselves…

On the right, I think I deployed very well, and played an excellent early game. My “traps” worked as intended this time, and I bagged his units there without real issues. Everything started out according to plan… but I didn’t really have a plan for after I removed those two units. I felt I needed to try and deal with his ranged abilities (as they could potentially each pick off a tiny unit of mine per turn...), so I tried to advance, which was a gamble that didn’t really pay off, as the supporting fire of my artillery didn’t hit. I need to work on plans with back-ups.

My opponent commented in-game that he was having a rough time deciding what to do. He never felt like he had easy choices to make on his turns, which, was encouraging for me. Damned if I do/Damned if I don’t situations tends to be what my good MSU armies give my opponents. So if I’m making life a little rough for my opponent, I think I’m getting better at this game!

In general, I think I need to play a little more cautiously. Kingdoms of Men aren’t great fighters or shooters… so the wins will need to come from good judgment and tactics (and traps). The luck of having that extra set of turns saved me this time for sure.

On my List…

Overall, I think I played the list better than I did last time. I still really like the Pole Arm Troops. While the 5+ to hit still isn’t great with the Ballistae, though I do like having them in my list for the time being. I will be looking to drop the Bowmen for the next iteration of the list though. They have a place in the army, but aren’t synergizing and supporting my list as well as I’d like currently. Time to explore other things.

On future lists…

My list was a slight variant of my previous OCD MSU list, this time replacing a Regiment of Pike with one of Foot Guard with shields. The Foot Guard seems like a better choice for an all-comers list, given their Defense 5. I think they performed well. I’m eager to finish up these transition projects and to start work on my Praetorian Guard models as more defensive Roman-inspired Foot Guard units for this army...

On offense and MSU…

One thing I have noted in my games is that I don’t have any real way to leverage a potential deployment advantage. I can’t really catch my opponent off guard, as all my stuff is just “more humans, which aren’t really menacing.” And while I can win some fights through strength in numbers… I think that as the games get larger, the dog pile will rapidly cease being effective and I’ll need to up my offensive game with real honest-to-goodness offensive units that have keywords like Thunderous Charge, Piercing, and Crushing Strength.

While KoM does have some good ranged options (in terms of having Pierce); 5+ across the board to hit isn’t great to rely on... so while some more ranged units may find their way into my lists as support, I think I’ll be focusing more on adding more potent melee units for my offense punch.

A cavalry regiment with Maccwaw’s Potion of the Caterpillar is a popular choice for many armies it seems. While it seems like a reliable fall back option (I have two regiments of Knights already), I think I’d like to try out a Beast of War and some Troops of Mounted Sergeants in the coming games. The Beast of war can be a brutal final deployment, or just a powerful normal one, and I haven’t seen any lists with Mounted Sergeants and want to try them out as I think they have a lot of potential.

The elephant in the room is Bane Chant... which can theoretically just take any existing unit in my list and make it more deadly. While a pretty good option usually… BC doesn’t strike me as the best choice for an MSU list.

To be sure, a wizard with bane-chant (and the Talisman of Inspiration) will make his way into my future lists as the utility is just too darn good to pass up… but, playing MSU, as a rule, I want to invest my points in more units rather than in buffs for them.

Anyways, that's enough thinking and wording for now. Thanks for reading!

Thoughts on the Mausoleum Battle

For those wanting to do battle reports… some simple advice I have would be to prep a few index cards beforehand. Write “My Turn X/Their Turn X” on either side. As the turns transition in game, snap a pic of the appropriate card to break up your photos stream. I took a little over 30 photos for this game, and while I could reconstruct the game pretty well the next day, I think having that card as a little simple reminder could help me out organizationally in the future. Heck, you could even use them in game for turn counters too.

So, this is obviously my first Battle Report for the blog. I think I tried to do a little too much on Monday, but overall, it was a good time and a good learning experience for everyone. In summary, I tried to:

·         Build two decent lists from models I had sitting around (no proxies) and limiting myself to the KoM units available in the Free Rules, then

·         Run those two lists effectively while I

·         Teach the game to two new players, who had barely glimpsed the rules beforehand, all while

·         Taking pictures (I gave up on taking notes) for the upcoming report

So…. Monday was a busy night for me. And this is all before I sat down to write up the report. Fortunately, this is a nice, clean ruleset. Stuff was easy to find and figure out to clarify in-game, and we made good progress despite a number of conversational tangents and a friend stopping by the FLGS. As we stood around the table, warming up from the cold Wisconsin weather, we decided to simplify a few things to save time and hassle.

1)      We’d just play the kill scenario. It seemed easy to try for intro game. We’ll roll for scenario next time, but learning a new system is hard, and simple is good.

2)      We’d all deploy simultaneously. The shop was unexpectedly crowded, and it was easier to just start plopping stuff down rather than play the deployment mini game. Not my usual approach, but it was a necessity this time.

As for the game analysis… well, hah, I got stomped! The aim of the game was to have fun and introduce two new players to the basics of the system, which definitely happened. As mentioned above, I had a lot on my plate, and would rather broad-stroke this first game’s analysis than suss out my errors with an eye to detail.

DEPLOYMENT!

In “deployment” I unpacked the Knights on the right of the table, so that’s where they stayed. Pre-game, I theorized that I would like to have the knights trying to break through the ogres, supported by both shooting regiments; and the MSU list trying to overwhelm the undead with tons of flank charges (dominating large hordes with flank charges is what MSU is supposed to be good at)… but that’s not the way it unfolded.

As the game began, my opponents voiced their (opposite) opinion, and were worried that I had deployed ideally to counter them; many units to overwhelm the tough ogres and some hearty knights to heroically charge in and blunt the damage from the shambling hordes. Well… who knows what might have been, but we all saw how the game went!

DICE!

I’ve had pretty cold dice recently. My opponents, on the other hand, were rolling pretty darn well the other night. Even when forced to reroll many of their nerve checks on my units… they were consistently rerolling that 10+ needed and my units were melting away all game. Losing units is one of the principal dangers with playing MSU, mitigated by taking so many, but when my supposedly sturdier Regiments start disappearing on a string of lucky rolls (and luckier forced rerolls)... there’s really nothing that can be said.

Lucky dice hurt my right flank on their T1, which led to improbable, desperate and ultimately futile plays on my turns, which in turn lead to further losses for me on their turns. Vicious cycle there on that right flank..

HERO ON PEGASUS!

The Hero on Pegasus charging the Werewolves was a particularly poor choice. He had the speed and could have potentially (momentarily) abandoned the right flank to hammer an ogre unit on the left, then returned (with some freed up infantry) to try and counter the undead as they steamrolled my right flank. I’ve only run this guy a few times, and keep using him terribly. He should be a force multiplier, threatening flank and rear charges, not a 90 point kamikaze.

SCOUTS WITH PISTOLS!

Speaking of using terribly, here is another unit I have yet to learn. They can obviously be suicidal chaff, running up, blasting away and then take a charge and get murdered, but 100 points was a little hard to swallow for chaff, so I had been trying to find alternative uses for them…

On the right, I marched them up, hoping to be quick and clever and take out the catapult; but I forgot werewolves were so quick and nimble, they were soundly outmaneuvered, and then they defaulted to being 1-shot chaff.

On the left, they were a little better. I deployed them back so I wouldn’t be tempted to march up. Seeing how the enemy was then deployed, I positioned them to get a possible flank charge on the chariots, should they break through and near my lines. When that didn’t transpire, and I deemed that treat “contained,” by all my infantry, I moved them out with my wizard in an attempt to deal with the lurking ogre warlock. They tried, but succumbed to enemy ranged units.

I’ll keep experimenting with these guys. I like my models, but the drawback is their shorter range. They can occasionally get in a shot without fearing melee, but to shoot they usually need to get close enough to be in some kind of danger… and they do no weather damage well.

The left ones were used better, and I still think a good potential role for them is “protectors of the static back line,” defending war machines and units of stationary shooters… but the question would then arise: wouldn’t those 100 points be spent better elsewhere? Spent say, offensively rather than on a half-baked contingency plan for a possible threat in the mid-to-late game?

SCOUTS WITH CARBINES!

This game, I used these (I think) a bit smarter than I had used them in previous games, though still not all that well. They stuck by my MSU infantry units. My ogre opponent recognized the dilemma they posed to him (namely, it would be hard for him to charge them without getting countercharged by a bunch of infantry), and this forced a standoff for a while between those two lines.

However, I could have used them far better. I kept forgetting overruns were not a thing, and that the ogres couldn’t simply plow through the scouts into my infantry… old habits die hard. I had them up 5-6” from my infantry to try and mitigate the overrun potential… eventually, he charged in, crushed the scouts and then moved back, exploiting an error in my formation and removing the threat without retribution. In the future, the infantry will be right behind the scouts to apply better pressure and threat of countercharge. Had I done that in game, I probably could have pushed out and dismantled those two ogre units with their big scary weapons quickly by forcing them to commit to unfavorable combats rather than dance around for those few turns.

(VERY) INSPIRING!

I took the general out of necessity: I couldn’t use the tried-and-true Inspiring Wizard kit; I had no other ASBs around; the Captain seemed like bad choice for trying to inspire cavalry…. So I was forced to take him and try him out. I think I used him well enough (could have gotten slightly closer to the Knights to charge in with them (was about an inch short, as it turned out), but other than that I think I used him ok. There wasn’t a lot he could do after that flank started to crumble.

Overall, I covered my army decently well with just the two sources; my opponents just kept rolling and rerolling ungodly high for nerve checks though. I forced a lot of rerolls, but I think they only failed one, and that was near the end of the game, when I had so very little left.

Most importantly…. KoM MSU!

As mentioned earlier on in this post, I took what models/units I had, which included some less than ideal choices for infantry-based MSU. The infantry regiments can look impressive (so many models on the table!), but ultimately the Pole Arm Regiments (in particular) can’t take a hit that well. I had a lot of units and models, but nothing could really play that well defensively.

Now, I don’t think that my Shield Wall Regiment should survive a charge from a superior unit, and it probably has even odds on survivability from a similar unit. I believe that in this game, an MSU defensive unit will almost always not survive the hit, and is indeed expected to be sacrificed in order to get those favorable countercharges the following turn. That’s part of the deal when you decide to play MSU in this game.

I do think I can build and play a little smarter though. In the next few games, focusing on my infantry I’d really like to explore:

·         Regiments of Pike, Shield Wall, Spear Phalanx, and Foot Guard with shields – all semi anchors to give my lines a little more stability.

·         Troops of Pole Arms and Foot Guard with two handers (maybe some militia or berserkers too...) – the numerous mini hammer units, designed to swarm and overwhelm my opponent’s lines.

·         Better supporting my infantry with Scouts. I think there is a lot of synergy there that I could leverage, taking better advantage of combats not chaining together.

I find I grow more impressed with Kings of War each game I play. Can’t want to get some more game time in with this army. GG.