Setting the Stage for Battle:
The vikings arrived on the shores of Vinland several weeks ago. They have been trading amicably with the skraelings since landing, exchanging cloth for pelts. Some of the natives do not approve of trading with the strange newcomers and ambush a viking patrol, killing them to a man. In retaliation, the vikings decide to completely destroy the nearest native settlement, leaving no one alive.
The vikings have only a small crew with 2 captains, 10 hearthguard with mail, and 8 lightly armored warriors. The skrealings have a warlord, 2 bodyguards, 12 warriors and 6 archers to defend their land with. The natives are unarmored and their stone weapons are not much of a match for mail and shields. This battle will depend on the natives using their defensive position, archers and extra man to beat the vikings.
The vikings start the battle on the beach next to their camp. They will have an initial 1D6 moves before the game starts to represent them sneaking through the woods towards the natives. The natives have a 6 man group watching the vikings from an outpost and the rest of their men in the walled village. The stream and fields can be crossed regularly. The wattle fence around the village is defensible.
The vikings earn 2 initial moves and win the first initiative, letting them reach the skraeling outpost before they can react. The archers manage to fire into the rampaging vikings but do not cause any damage with their stone tipped arrows.
The first combat of the game is surprising. Despite the advantage of surprise and their heavier weaponry, a viking falls to the spears of the skraelings.
Winning priority again, the vikings swarm the outpost, giving no chance for a retreat to the village.
The Vikings overwhelm the outpost this turn, killing all but the two archers stationed on the tower. A viking captain stays behind to deal with them. Despite his rank, it takes him the rest of the game to dispatch both archers. This ongoing combat keeps these three men out of the battle for the duration.
As the outpost falls, the vikings split into two groups and head at full speed for the village. One group aims for the chief and his shield wall defending the gap in the fence, while the other charges at a weekly defended flank. Archers behind the fence fell a running viking.
The vikings reach the lightly defended wall and push back the skraelings. A lucky priority win means that the skraelings are able to quickly get back into position and prevent the vikings from capitalizing on the opening.
The viking shield wall on the left hammers into the gap, killing the chief and overlapping both sides of the skraeling shield wall in the first combat.
As the chiefs warriors crumble, the viking right breaks through the fence. The skraelings are broken and flee the field.
The battle ended as expected. the heavily armored vikings were able to win priority most turns, preventing the skraelings from consolidating into a large group. If the skraelings at the outpost could have retreated to the village and helped to defend the fence the battle might have turned out differently. Alternatively, the chief could have led a shield wall in a sally to try and isolate one wing of the vikings and overwhelm them. The skraelings static defense and inability to react to the viking moves led to their demise.
Nice looking game Gabe! How do you handle hand to hand combat - do you add their combat factors to the D6? LotR is a smooth system and i like the heroic factors but as i play mostly solo the games in the Two Hour Wargames stable tick my boxes. Good luck with the blog - I'll keep an eye on it!
ReplyDeleteThanks! Combat is done using the attacks on a soldiers profile. Soldiers generally have one attack and captains 2. A fight commences when one soldier charges an enemy. Spear men can support and add an attack (the benefit of of a shield wall). Also, multiple soldiers can surround one enemy, each contributing their attack. For example, the native chief was attacked by two Vikings and one supporting spearman. This is three dice to the Chiefs two. All the the dice are rolled with highest roll winning the combat. The winner then rolls on a wound chart to see if they killed the loser. It's simpler than it sounds!
DeleteGreat scenario! Really good looking table too. Impressive!
ReplyDelete