I've been collecting and painting since 2008, but I finally found a real opponent to play a game with! We had our game on Valentine's day, so I fielded Rivendell Elved led by the Twins. The Twins are like Romeo and Juliet, you have to field them together and they go berserk if the other is killed. I had 500 pts of spearmen, swordsmen and a generic captain and banner plus the twins. I thought my opponent would field orcs or goblins--I find out the night before that he's bringing one or two mumaks!
He ended up fielding 500pts, with a mumak and it's commander, 12 archers in the howdah and the rest were spearmen on the ground.
I put as many trees on the board as I could fit, but I only had one wooded terrain in a 10" triangle on my left flank and a 6" triangle of difficult terrain in the middle of my 1/3 of the board. The rest were just trees. We decided that I would get trees, but the mumak could trample them. There was also a ruin in the middle of the board, but the mumak took that out 1st turn.
Because I brought no archers, (a strategic oversight?)
we let him go first. I hid in the trees to escape his archers and pretty much passed until the mumak began to approach the trees. It took three or four turns, then heroic charge by about half the elves. One of the twins flubbed and ran right off the get-go. The elves' legendary courage held thoughout the game, with only about 1/8 of them failing to charge the mumak.
It took several turns of chopping against a massive grey mountain, but the ivory tower did eventually come down. Only the commander survived the fall. We forgot that for every wound the mumak has to do a courage check, until the second to last turn of elven chopping. It only managed to charge once, and unfortunately it crushed two elves before being stopped by a captain of mine. It killed no haradrim--loyal beast! I should've marched it off the table, as it was on my left flank, but I'd never played with or against the mumak before and someone was getting crushed!
Following the collapse of the ivory tower, the haradrim finally found themselves engaging the elves. Outnumbered, the elves held their own very well, but began to fall. One twin was finally killed after being trapped and failing to shield againt no less than six haradrim. Both forces were broken that turn. We called the game, as the store was closing.
Post-game thoughts: Elves did really well, and I was totally impressed by them. The mumak gave the archers the ability to shoot and hit almost every elf without in the way checks of what would otherwise be warm bodies.
My opponent wisely tried to take out the banner with his archers, but even with poisoned arrows, elf armour is really resiliant. I think he only took out one or two swordsmen all game. Initially he questioned my no bow elves, but I think they proved my strategy. I decided for the cost of elves, I'd rather have shields and spears than bows. They are only strength 3 and can move only half and shoot. I had such a small warband (22 figs) that I wanted everyone to engage the enemy and not to have to risk splitting my elves. I think it worked to everyone's surprise very well.
Next game: I'm ditching the Twins, as they were only for theme and I was unimpressed by them. I thought the generic captain did very well, so I ordered another banner and captain before I left. In a bigger game, I'd love to field Gil-galad and his elite elves. They would take down the mumak even faster. I'd love to see how they would do against two mumaks. Honestly, because we play such small games due to time restriction, I'm probably going to field Gildor and try some wood elves. I like that his magic could effect the mumak, and I'm curious to see how wood elves would do. Their lower defense makes me nervous, though. They might just wilt under the bow fire. I'd like to take a few heroes with bows, simply to shoot the mumak commander have a chance at charging where I want it to go before engaging it with choppers. I'd like to try some cavalry, too. We're both looking forward to a rematch!
{ PORTAL }
Print view
Top
