WOTR battle report

I managed to get my brother into a game of War of the Ring this weekend, so here is my very first battle report!
We played Isengard vs an Eriador alliance. My list was: Saruman the White Hand.
               2 coy Uruk-Hai with shields
               2 coy Uruk-Hai Phalanx
               2 coy Uruk Scouts with shields
               2 coy Dunlending Huscarls with shields
               1 coy Uruk-Hai with Crossbows
               1 coy Uruk-Hai Scouts with bows
               Cave Troll ally (I wanted to try monsters)
               3 coy Warg Riders
His list:    Treebeard
               Forlong the Fat (We used the profile from the legendary formation as Epic Hero)
               Meriadoc, Esquire of Rohan
               2 coy Dwarves with shields
               1 coy Dwarf archers
               3 coy Rangers of Arnor
So I felt rather confident at the beginning, until I saw the map he'd made. It was a river flowing through a barren plain with an island in the middle, with 2 fords on my side and one on his, and 1 in the piece beneath the island. The island was heavily wooded and had several impassable hills on it, which prevented effective arcery. There also was an inn on his side of the river.

Turn 1
Eriador won priority and kept it. both advanced at full speed, so no shooting. I forgot about At the Double! (we forgot a lot of things, such as the boosts heroes give to formations). With no charges we went on to turn two.
Turn 2
Eriador won priority and again kept it. He pushed on with Treebeard, the Rangers and both Dwarf formations. I pushed forward too, placing the Uruk Warriors close to Treebeard (too close!). I then moved Saruman in to them, big Mistake no 2. I then started on spells. First I cast Exsiccate on Treebeard, rolling a 1. Then I past the Focus test on a 2 and cast Dark Fury. A 1. Again rolling a 2 for the Focus, I cast Bolt of Fire on Treebeard, which resulted in another 1. Saruman uses overlord to make the Crossbows Heroic Shoot, missing Treebeard completely (my brother had pointed out the Heroic Duel possiblity, so I panicked a bit). In the Charge phase, Treebeard charges the Uruks. On to the Fight fase, where Saruman gets punished for his ineptitude, being ripped to pieces by Treebeard, and taking half a company of Uruks with him. The rest get butchered in the ensuing fight phase. Oops!
Turn 3- Here my memory fails me as to what was in which turn
Eriador wins priority again but gives it to me out of pure kindness. Not that it helped... The Dunlendings and Troll turn around to exact revenge on Treebeard, but only one formation can charge him at a time, thanks to those bloody hills! The scouts fire at Treebeard, scoring two actual hits, my only proper rolls in the whole game! Treebeard gets one wound thanks to this. The warg Riders kill some dwarves, and Treebeard picks up some grass (? He was in a plain, but still has throwing weapons) and kills three scouts with it. On the other flank, the Warg Riders charge his Archers and get flank charged by the dwarf warriors. They die.

I can't remember the rest (I'll take notes or pictures next time), but it went on like that, Treebeard slaughtering everything in his path and the rest of my army generally failing in everything they're supposed to do. In the 6th turn I surrendered, saving him the pain of moving Treebeard all across the board to kill my only remaining formation, the Phalanx.

Conclusion: I don't think Treebeard is that overpowered once you get big formations to face him, but we put on the table what we had, and in 600 (ish) points, he's just overkill. The terrain was a mighty help to him as well, preventing multiple charges and flanking maneuveres. It reminded me of the last game we had, using my own (worthless in comparison) rules, where his rangers stood behind some Dwarves with shields and shot everything in range.

Ps: Next time there will be photos... If I remember.

Finally! and Austrian Brigade

Sorry for the lack of activity over the last few weeks, we had a test week, so I was a bit preoccupied. Anyway, before the test week began, I managed to paint (and rebase) my Austrian brigade. So here it is:

The Full army.

O'Reilly Cheveaux-Légers. These are Hät Austrian Cheveaux-Leger

The Banner Bearer.

Hät Austrian Grenzer with officer.

The main infantry formation: two companies of German Fusiliers. (from Italeri Austrian&Russian General Staff)

Showing off my first conversion ever! (a simple head swap between the grenadier officer and fusilier drummer in the Italeri box)

A 12pdr Gun from the Hät Austrian Artillery set

Last but not least two shots of the Hät Austrian Cuirassiers.

I also managed to obtain another box of Uruk-Hai, a box of Warriors of Minas Tirith and bases for my Anglo-Saxon Dunlendings, so expect to see some LOTR stuff here soon!

Russians

Here's the Russian Brigade promised earlier:

The full brigade.

Pavlovski Grenadiers, these will count as Imperial Guard on the tabletop, as this is entirely befitting their elite status.

A close up on the converted banner bearer, made from a sergeant and an English Infantry (also Italeri) banner.

Guard Cossacks

Militia.

The poor officer who's got to keep all those rowdy serfs in line :-).

The gun.

French Brigade Pictures.

As promised earlier on, here are the pictures of my French brigade.

The full brigade.

Imperial Guard Lancer Trumpeteer. I don't like the way the coat turned out, GW Scab Red is really to dark...

The rest of the squad.. I know the basing is awful, but its the only thing where I can actually get the double side sticky tape to actually stick.

Horse Artillery with limber.

Conscript Fusiliers/Young Guard

Les Grognards, the Old Guard with full staff.

Officer.

Dragoons. These are the only non-Imperial Guard unit in the brigade.

Close up of the limber crew.


The Russians will come as soon as I return from a holiday in Berlin.

French and Russian Brigades!

This weekend, I finished painting my Vive l'Empereur (my home-made rulebook) French and Russian brigades. There are no pictures, as I can't get them from my camera to my computer. The French brigade is:
   -One Company of Old Guard (Italeri French Grenadiers).
   - One Company of Dragoons (Italeri French Dragoons).
   - One Company of Cheveaux-Legers Lanciers (Italeri Dutch/Polish Lancers, painted as Dutch).
   -Three Companies of Conscript Fusiliers (Italeri French Line Infantry, actually Young Guard).
   -One Battery of Artillerie á Cheval (Italeri French Line Horse Artillery) with Limber.


The Russians consist of:
   -One Company of Guard Infantry (Pavlovski Grenadiers from Italeri Austrian&Russian Staff)
   -One Company of Guard Cossacks (Italeri Cossacks)
   -One Company of Irregular Cossacks (Strelets-r Crimean Terek Cossacks)
   -Four Company of Town Militia (Hät Russian Militia, the ones with muskets)
   -One Battery of 6pdrs. (ESCI Crimean Russian Artillery)

Hopefully I'll be able to get my brother into a battle with these soon!
I'll post some pictures as soon as I figure out how.

First Post!

In this blog I'll try to keep track of the building of my armies and how they perform on the battlefield, of course. At the moment I'm building four armies: - A War of the Ring Isengard Army
            -Napoleonic Austrians
            -Napoleonic French
            -WOII Germans

At the moment the Napoleonics are my main focus, as the Germans are almost finished and Isengard costs a LOT of money.