L: Prophetess - level 4, silver mirror
H: Damsel - level 2, warhorse, scroll
H: Damsel - level 2, warhorse, chalice of malfleur
H: Paladin - BSB, sword of might, gromril great helm, shield, barded warhorse
C: 8 KotR - full command
C: 8 KotR - full command
C: 9 Errants - full command
C: 8 Errants - errantry banner, full command
C: 20 Men at Arms - full command
C: 20 Men at Arms - full command
C: 10 Bowmen - skirmishing
C: 10 Bowmen - flaming arrows, stakes
S: 3 Pegasus Knights - full command
S: 5 Yeomen - musician, shields
R: Treb
Damsels rode in the back of the KotR units, prophetess hung out with some M@A, BSB with the errantry errants (and the only unit I was worried about actually taking my HPA down).
Spells:
Prophetess - bear's anger, crow's feast, hunter's spear, wolf hunts
Damsel - mistress of the marsh, master of the wood
Damsel - healing touch, master of stone
Vermin Lord - pestilent breath, bless with filth, wither, cloud of corruption
Plague Priest - pestilent breath, cloud of corruption [he never cast anything]
Engineer - warp lightning, scorch
Game was pitched battle, deployment as the pic:
Brets prayed, so Skaven took it away!
Skaven 1
HPA scooted forward ~9", clanrat blocks shuffled a bit, ratters moved up a bit for range, slaves tooled up for irritation next turn, globies moved up the flanks on intercept courses and the vermin lord slammed 16" forward around the woods to bring the heat. First round of magic saw the stake bowmen lightninged down 3 and paniced back, and the VL wither the peg knights and get off his first blast of corruption. The cloud tagged the pegs, skirmishers, treb and mounted yeomen (missed the M@A with level 4 on a 1), but wounds were minimal - 1 yeoman, 2 bowmen and solid wards on the pegs. The WLC lasered out a shot at the tightly packed KotR units, but strong deviation meant just 2 knights were tagged off the back of the unit - yay for no partials! Jezzails did nothing to those KotR.
Bret 1
The bretons began with much lamenting of the peasants blocking in all the knights behind them ... The line bowmen rallied and the prophetess jumped in with them, and other movement was cautious shuffling about to primarily keep the VL from flank charging anybody. The pegs flew down by the right woods, with LoS on the WLC. Bret magic was squashed, except for a crow's feast which was let go on the VL, trusting to the dice to see him through. 11 hits later he took just 1 wound. Shooting flopped, with the treb scattering 10" into nothing and the skirmishing bowmen unable to wound the VL.
Skaven 2
The VL charged the skirmishing bowmen, with the intent of carrying into the treb in line with them - the peasants fled, ran 4" and were caught, and the VL slammed into the treb instead. The HPA scooted 9-10" towards the action in the middle of the table, with globies trailed along with it. The right globies moved up into the woods near the pegs to toss stuff at them, but I didn't trust that the pegs would take the globadier bait, so the WLC was scooted up behind the impassable ruin to block LoS to the pegs. And the slaves moved up to be irritating, baiting charges from both M@A and a couple knight units.
Magic saw a lot of nothing, but drew a scroll. Shooting saw the ratters grind down a good number of M@A from the left unit, the jezzails failed to hurt the errants headed their way, and the right globes gas 3 wounds off the pegs. As expected the VL creamed the treb crew, but left one alive to autobreak, and the VL failed his restrain roll and chased it off the table edge.
Bret 2
The slave baits were taken, with the left slaves fleeing a KotR + M@A charge (they fled 3+1", escaping the M@A but being trampled down by the knights, while also drawing them into counter-charge position by some character-less clanrats), and the right slaves taking the charge from a somewhat-depleted M@A unit. The remaining knights played it more or less cagey, out of fear of the HPA and VL, though the left errants readied for a charge on the jezzails next turn. The pegs forgot to move entirely ...
Magic this turn was a lesson in the importance of going for fewer but better casts than sheer quantity of attempts - brets threw 5 2-dice casts on 7 or 8+ spells, but only got healing touch off on the damsel who had poisoned herself with the chalice last turn (I let it threw in case he was going to put serious dice into wolf's hunt on the KotR who ran down the slaves). The flaming archers failed to hurt the HPA. In combat, the M@A fluffed against the slaves, but despite using their halberds, the peasants managed to save both slave pokes on 6's. Shockingly the slaves won by 1 (outnumber, nat') but the M@A held.
Skaven 3
The HPA gribbled after the M@A that had chased the slaves, but they failed terror and fled away, exposing the A-bomb's flank to the BSB and her S6 errants ... The characterless clanrats charged the overrun KotR, and their ratter had to as well to get out of the way (where's my doomflayer conversion when I need it??). Meanwhile the left globes prepared to rock the errants descending on the jezzails, the right globes sat tight and readied another volley for the pegs, the BSB made sure the HPA was in his 12" bubble, and the VL zoomed back onto the scene, positioned to wither, vomit and fart all over the BSB's errants.
Only the last of those happened, with cloud of corruption claiming 2 more yeomen (panicing them south), 5 slaves (!), 0 errants (great wards continue), maybe a M@A, and all but 2 of the bowmen that the level 4 was sheltering with. Wither did draw out the silver mirror too, though the S6 hit was warded by the VL. Shooting saw the combined might of 7 globadiers, 6 jezzails and 1 ratter kill 3 of the errants headed down the left flank, which was enough to panic the young knights back. The right globes fared less well and killed 1 of themselves for 0 wounds to the pegs. Combat time and the clanrats + ratter managed 0 wounds as expected, but admirably blocked all the S3 attaks in return. The KotR lost by 2 but held. The slaves, having lost a rank and outnumber thanks to the Vermin Lord, lost to the M@A and detonated, taking a couple down, as well as a couple from the M@A fleeing in terror from the HPA. w00t?
Bret 3
With a mighty 'HUZZAH!' the BSB's errants spurred into the abomination, though their heroics weren't entirely shared by the rest of the knights - the other errants failed to rally and ran off the table, the yeomen failed to rally as well and ran into an impassable ruin, and the level 4 left her 2 bowmen bodyguards to face the VL alone and ran off by herself. The full strength KotR lance jockeyed for position around the HPA/errant fight, trying to squeeze between them and the wood, and the pegs finally got it together and flitted over to look at the WLC again.
Magic saw a damsel succeed in crushing 3 jezzails with master of stone (she had tried all game now, tenacious chick that she is) and paniced them off the board, as well as the level 4 focusing a lot of aggression on the VL. I let through crow's feast hoping to get lucky again, and was rewarded with 1 wound that was warded. A failed dispel against hunter's spear made me worry, but his T5 kept him safe. After the two bowmen missed the towering daemon in front of them (?!), it was time for fighting. The errants slammed 4+ wounds onto the HPA, but all but 2 were regen'd. In return the huge gribbly rolled up 10 attaks and put them all into the BSB. He was surprised, but probability did what I thought it would: 10 attaks -> 6 hits -> 6 wounds -> 6 5+ rerollable saves -> 2 5+ wards -> 1 wound. The HPA held easily on stubborn 8. In the other fight, the clanrats continued to hold their shields up like good minions and beat the KotR by 2, but this time the knights broke (BSB no help) and were crossfired by the Abomination.
Skaven 4
Only in the second half, but things were looking pretty end game for the brets. The gutters finally showed up and swarmed the prophetess, ready to spit throwing stars all over her. The VL boosted way up to glare at the fresh KotR lance, while globadiers mobilized for table quarters and clanrat blocks just rearranged in case those KotR survived or the HPA fell.
Magic flopped, which was probably for the better - the VL's corruption bomb would have hit a lot of tiny skaven units and the HPA, not to mention the bret stuff. Shooting was mostly sad - ratters failed to hurt KotR or pegs, the warpfire thrower turned on for the first time all game and detonated (!) taking out 3 clanrats from the bus (30 clanrats + BSB + engineer) though panic was passed on a shaky 9. The WLC, in its last action before being ka-pegged, dropped a 2" guess onto the M@A in front of it, but a massive scatter later nobody died. However, the gutter's earned 5x their points by taking out the prophetess with a hearty round of throwing stars - 6 shots, 3 wounds, 3 failed wards. In combat the HPA took no wounds and decided to feed, devouring the errant champ but failing to wound the BSB. It held no prob.
Bret 4
Opening terror tests sealed the deal, as the KotR lance fled from the VL and was crossfired by some globadiers in the foods. With that the Brets conceded.
SKAVEN MASSACRE
A fun game, if one that I feel I was in control of from the VL's rush up the right flank on. I feel like I was let down pretty hard by my magic, or at least the VL was in position to do a LOT of damage, but 6 dice at his disposal weren't enough. The priest literally never did anything with his 2 dice, and the engineer's 2 tossed into warp lightning were easily dealt with by damsel's with MR(1) or absorbed by MR-less peasant fodder. This was my first experience with cloud of corruption though, and definitely dig it on the VL when he's going Rambo like that.
Also it should be said, playing against an opponent who is still playing the Psychology Game is somewhat startling after all the ItP armies out there. Better certainly, and it makes my pretty minimal firepower seem almost adequate, with panic a possibility. And terror certainly drove that last nail into the coffin, as it has for me in a number of games.
All the same I wish my WoT were painted. This skaven army feels too tiny and underpowered to be really competitive, but I don't want to drop the Big Boys, even if the VL sucks up so many fakking points ...
Painting: Nurglettes
Building: N/A
