Battle Report - Ratkin vs. The Brotherhood in Invade

On Saturday Neil came over the hill to have a game while his wife was busy in the city. I wasn't sure what he was bringing but he turned up with The Brotherhood while I used the Ratkin that I had used at Call to Arms.

Neil's list was as follows:

• Villein Martyr Horde
• 2x Order of the Brotherhood Regiments (one with Caterpillar)
• 2x Villein Initiate Regiments
• Order of Redemption Troop
• Villein Reconnoiterers Troop
• 2x Order of the Forsaken Regiments
• 2x Villein Siege Artillery
• 2x Forsaken Beasts (both with Breath Attacks)

My list was:

 

• 3x Tunnel Slave Regiments
• 2x Shock Troop Hordes
• Blight Horde
• Vermintide Regiment
• 2x Weapons Team (both with Storm of Lead)
• 2x Death Engines (both with Vile Sorcery)
• Swarm-Crier
• Warlock (with Bane Chant and Inspiring Talisman)
• Daemon-Spawn (Fly)

The Brotherhood was different in that it had no characters while like me Neil was only spending 20 points on Magic Items. Interestingly this seems to be a growing trend in our meta.

The table too was interesting. I wanted to use my THM Volcanic terrain so we had a battlefield with a lot of Impassable terrain with nothing over Height 2. This gave no hiding spots for Monsters on both sides.

We rolled up "Invade" and Neil had the first turn. During the battle I took pictures after each of my turns.

The first turn saw a tentative move forward by the Brotherhood towards what looked like my weakened centre. I moved my guys forward so they remain just out of charge range.

On my right I tried to move my Shock Troops into positions where they could then move into the opposing half.

The first rounds of shooting were ineffective from both sides. Neil's Trebs both missed while my engines inflicted four wounds on the Initiates in front.

I moved my Vermintide forward inside range of the Forsaken but with Daemon behind.

In came the Forsaken doing 4 wounds on my Vermintide which held. The Daemon took four wounds from the Treb but jumped over the combat to remove it from play. At the time I thought this quite clever on my part but I had forgotten that the Beasts had Breath Attacks. The Vermintide countercharged the Forsaken, disordering them so they couldn't fly.

On my left the full weight of Ratkin shooting opened up on the Initiates leaving them on Autobreak unless I rolled "snake eyes". Of course I then rolled that. This allowed the second unit of Forsaken plus the Initiates to charge one Death Engine doing ten wounds. It held.

In my subsequent turn I charged both Death Engines into the Forsaken destroying them while a Weapons Team did a wound so that the Initiates couldn't escape a second Nerve Check. You can see I have used my Weapons Team as a block in front of the Order Regiment.

On the right the Shock Troops have move in front of the Martyrs while the Daemon has taken two breath attacks and is now Wavered on 10 wounds (just out of picture in top right). Tunnel Slaves are blocking more Initiates.

Here you can see the predicament the not so clever Daemon has got himself into.

Slaves doing what Slaves do best. Blocking and wounding.

Below the Daemon is saved by the plucky Warlock. In Neil's turn he charged the Daemon with the Beast doing three wounds. The Daemon managed to survive on a Waver...yes I rolled a three. I think Neil made a mistake not putting both Beasts breath attacks into action rather than charging. Average says three wounds vs. two but much more upside with ranged attacks. Instead he breathed on Warlock who was unharmed and the Two Shock Troops took out Martyrs while the Warlock's four turns of Lightning Bolts finally killed the Beast, saving the Daemon.

Here the Brotherhood can be seen breaking through into my half.

My Death Engines charge but bounce. This will eventually result in one falling to the Order. The other Order dispose of the Slaves next turn.

Here you can see that one unit of Shock Troops has been destroyed by a combined charge from Initiates and The second Beast but that the Blight and Daemon have removed the Beast.

Moving into Neil's turn six, the Redemption have been Wavered. The Initiates can't quite get into my half if the ignore the Blight. However they do get far enough that the Blight would exit the opposition half if they charge. The Pegs will move up to a position to threaten the Daemon if their is a 7th turn.

The Death Engine removes the Initiates. Neil is now in a position to charge the Weapons Team with his Order.

In moving forward the Pegs have been high by two LBs and been removed. The Blight decided to stay in the scoring half rather than charge the non-scoring Order.

My Death Engine slips into Neil's half with Swarm-Crier. It is vulnerable to a Turn 7 charge but that will remove the Order from scoring.

The game ends on Turn Six with the Ratkin ahead 1100 to 335 in terms of scenario scoring. The Daemon was very lucky to survive after weathering the breath assault. I think Neil not pressing this forward was a key mistake in the end. I got lucky with a roll of 3 on the Daemon but the Snake Eyes earlier had stalled my left advantage.

Post battle Neil realised he had failed to deploy his light horse meaning he played a unit and 100 points down.

Overall it was a very fun game with things on a knife edge for long periods of time.

 

Posted with Blogsy