Squabbling over Spoils: Moria v Angmar Battle Report

 Grishna on the hunt (One Wiki to Rule Them All)

Grishna’s Warg halted, sniffing at the air. It snarled, and a moment later he could see why. The village on which their raiding party descended was held against them, and he could just make out the black-armoured figures of a Moria host through the smoke.

Calling out a command to his Warg Riders, Grishna urged his mount on towards the foe. The pitiful force of Goblins would be crushed, for these spoils belonged to the Witch King!

This week's article is something totally different again: a 500-point battle report detailing a recent battle against my friend Matt. The two armies were both ones on which Matt and I had worked together, so we each had a solid idea of what the other could do; both of our lists being quite unconventional, this was an important point. My force was:

Angmar Raiding Party

Warband 1

Barrow Wight (leader)

11 Orcs (5 shields, 6 spears, 1 banner)

Warband 2

               Barrow Wight

               11 Orcs (5 shields, 5 spears, 1 bow)

Warg Rider (throwing spear)

Warband 3

               Barrow Wight

               11 Orcs (5 shields, 5 spears, 1 bow)

Warg Rider (throwing spear)

Warband 4

               Orc Captain on Warg

               5 Wild Wargs

               3 Orcs (bows)

47 models, 2 Might, 5 bows

This list is a true horde army, with excellent manoeuvrability and some dangerous magical tricks in the form of Terror and 3 Paralyse casters.

Easily the scariest models in the list, and maybe the whole game (Battle Games in Middle Earth)

 

Cult of the Many Limbs

Warband 1

               Goblin Captain (leader)

8 Goblins (4 spears, 4 shields)

               Bat Swarm

Warband 2

               Goblin Captain

6 Goblins (3 spears, 3 shields)

               Warg Marauder

Warband 3

               Goblin Captain

6 Goblins (3 spears, 3 shields)

               Warg Marauder

Warband 4

               The Watcher in the Water

27 models, 7 Might, 4 bows

This list also has some decent numbers, but here the emphasis is placed on the big monster. The Watcher is a match for whole armies at this points level, so how the game goes will be largely dictated by the Watcher’s fortunes. If the Barrow Wights manage to bring it down, then the Orc numbers should see them overwhelm the Goblins. If the Watcher’s 5 Will and Resistant to Magic sees it through the magic unscathed, then it’s unlikely that anything will be able to stand up to it.

You really don't want to be the Orcs taking on this guy (Games Workshop)

 

Scenario and Deployment

The scenario was Lords of Battle, forcing both sides to get stuck in and slaughter the enemy without any objectives to complicate things. The map was dominated by a tower around which the Goblins deployed, splitting their forces to try and secure chokepoints on the map. Angmar’s deployment mirrored that of the Moria force, with two Orc warbands facing two Goblin warbands on the western side of the tower and the other two warbands ganging up on the Goblins on the eastern side. I contemplated a refused flank strategy of isolating the eastern Goblins, but the warbands on the west had their  flanks guarded by a fence, which would have made it difficult to bring my superior numbers to bear.

Both sides have divided their forces around the central tower. It's a risky move, will it pay off?

My gameplan was to try and leverage my superior troop quality (not something I often get to say with this army!) and numbers to dominate the Goblins and rack up the Wounds before the Watcher did too much damage. Matt, in contrast, was trying to delay me with the chokepoints provided by the map to give the Watcher time to win him the game.

 

Report

The game started out well for me, winning the first Priority roll. This allowed me to envelop his eastern warband with my Wild Wargs while the Orcs swept in from the front. My Captain, excited to find himself the strongest combat model on the field, charged into his opposite number in a fit of confidence.

The Orcs and Wargs launch their assault

 My Barrow Wight threw a Paralyse at the Goblin Captain on one die in the hopes of tilting the odds further in my favour, but Matt Resisted this with a natural 6. On the other flank, my Orcs swarmed the dug-in Goblins, with some of their number beginning the long trek to the end of the fence to outflank them. In combat, however, disaster struck, with my superior troops losing almost every fight to give Moria an unexpected lead in the scoring. Even glorious Grishna was pulled from his mount by the enemy Captain, though he survived unhurt.

The Western Orcs race forward to outflank the foe 

In the second turn, the Watcher in the Water burst from the earth in the middle of the Orc lines on the eastern flank. It was cleverly placed to separate the spear models (accompanied by the leader Barrow Wight and banner) from the shield models, who were promptly swarmed by the resurgent Goblins. Combined with the Warg Marauder that had just relocated across to this flank, the Eastern side of the tower suddenly looked hairy. I responded by cleverly placing my Orcs around the Watcher to ensure that it couldn’t pull my Wight or banner into combat with it because there were no available spaces. I also threw a Paralyse at it, but the beast shrugged it off with good use of Will. Matt promptly rolled a 6 for number of shots, killed two Orcs to clear a space next to it, and then pulled in my leader Wight with the final shot. Thankfully, he fluffed his Strikes to let my leader slip away unhurt, while elsewhere the Goblins continued to win combat after combat and slice their way through my poor Orcs with uncharacteristic skill. Things looked dire. The one bright point was on the western flank where the Bat Swarm was Trapped and took 3 Wounds. Matt had flown it over my lines to block my second Wight from Paralysing the Watcher, but it paid heavily for his cunning.

The Watcher emerges

I won back Priority in the next turn, rubbing my hands with glee as the second Wight moved into range. It rolled two dice and got the 6, forcing Matt to spend two Will (plus one for Resistant to Magic) and a Might to Resist. My leader Wight threw his last two Will at him, and he could only watch dejectedly as his Resist rolls failed to match my roll. The Watcher was Paralysed, and my hordes charged into combat (well, the ones that passed their Courage tests). Poor rolling from my Orcs saw only a single Wound inflicted, although at least it remained Paralysed. Elsewhere, my army seemed emboldened by the magic displayed, hacking through a number of Goblins on the Western flank and even Wounding a Captain. The Warg Marauders had finished carving up the last of my Wild Wargs however, and looked set to move onto my Orcs next. 

This is why I love Barrow Wights

The next several turns played out more or less as one might predict: the Watcher was slowly whittled down in combat, including by my Barrow Wights who had drawn their ghostly blades and charged into the fray; the western flank, now heavily outnumbered as my second warband of Orcs finally managed to outflank them, began to crumble; and the Warg Marauders and Goblins to the east ripped through those of my Orcs who had been cut off by the Watcher’s emergence. One Marauder even managed to run down Grishna, much to my dismay. The Watcher briefly recovered, only to be Paralysed again as my second Wight flung its last Will in to prevent a Goblin fightback.

At the end of the 6^th turn, two significant events occurred. One, the Moria force was Broken, the collapsing western flank taking them over half casualties. And two, the Watcher reawakened again (albeit now only on 1 Wound and with 3 Attacks). It promptly rolled another 6 for number of shots, killing three Orcs and pulling in and Rending my second Wight— the leader had run for the hills. The rest of his forces proved stubbornly brave, though at last the 2 Goblin Captains on the other flank were brought down.

Things suddenly look a lot hairier

At this point, Angmar was well ahead in Wounds inflicted, still a decent number of models from Breaking, and had slain the enemy leader. I was feeling quietly confident. But Morgoth was clearly smiling on the Moria forces, as the Watcher and the Marauders combined to kill a massive 12 models in a single turn! This signalled the deathknell of my eastern flank, with only a couple of scattered Orcs remaining to face the Moria elite. It also Broke me, and left the kill tallies almost even. Things looked grim once more.

But then Moria won Priority and the Watcher took its Break test. Normally it’s not too worried about this: 5 Will makes it an easy pass. But looking at his roll of a 6, Matt realised that my relentless magical barrage had stripped all of his Will. The Watcher disappeared, and while the Marauders wiped out my last eastern Orcs, the force on the West was unopposed and clearly victorious. We shook hands after a hard-fought Angmar victory, 6:1.

 

Highlights

The Watcher’s arrival was extremely dramatic, scattering my whole flank and my plans with it. In fact, despite being Paralysed for almost the entire game, the Watcher disrupted my army to such an extent that he was almost Matt’s man (kraken?) of the match. That honour, however, goes to…

1.      The Warg Marauders, whose devastating counterattack on the East swung the game back into Matt’s favour. Between them, the two models accounted for 5 Wild Wargs, my Captain, and almost a dozen Orcs, and they were still fighting at the end.

2.      My men of the match were the two Barrow Wights who Paralysed the Watcher. That thing is absolutely terrifying, and the only reason it didn’t have even more of an impact was that it spent most of the game Prone and helpless. The fact that they were able to muscle through 5 Will and Resistant to Magic (twice!) was very impressive.

This picture contains the three models that almost won Matt

Tactical Review

Overall, I was fairly happy with how I executed my gameplan. I was able to lock down the Watcher with magic, and eventually my Orcs were able to grind down the enemy as I knew they would. I do wish they’d remembered how to roll better than 3 before the third turn, but I guess you can’t have everything. I do think I made a few mistakes in deployment though. I should have swapped Grishna’s warband with the western-most Wight’s warband. That would have ensured that I had more numbers on the eastern side of the tower, where I really needed them, and would have placed my fastest models in position to sweep around the fence and attack Matt from behind. I had expected the eastern flank to fall quite quickly, Matt being very outnumbered there, and had wanted to ensure I had troops in place who could rapidly redeploy to attack the other flank. But the arrival of the Watcher totally shut that plan down, and it left almost a whole warband of Orcs well out of position.

There's a lot of Orcs in this picture, but only about half of them are fighting

Matt was happy with his deployment for exactly this reason; it took many of my troops out of the fight and neutered my numerical edge. But he thinks he may have erred in his placement of the Watcher. While it was very visually impressive to split my battleline in two, the Watcher would have been much safer from Paralysis if it had appeared at the edge of my line instead of right in the middle. I’m not sure I agree with this, however, because I had been prepared to abandon that flank if his Watcher popped up there. At only Move 4 it would have struggled to catch my retreating Orcs and Wargs, who could have focussed on his western flank instead. The only thing that prevented that cunning plan was his arrival in the middle of my lines, cutting off a number of models from a clean getaway.

 

Army Review

Both armies put in a good showing. The Watcher was always going to struggle when faced with 3 Barrow Wights (as will any centrepiece model really!), but the Goblin supporting cast did an excellent job of holding up a much larger force in the absence of the big bad. The Marauders in particular really earned their keep, convincing both of us that they’re worth keeping over a few more Goblins or another Bat Swarm.

For Angmar, we were both impressed by the sheer durability of the list. It took so many casualties in the early turns to Matt’s crazy rolling, but was able to just keep on trucking. A Break Point of 24 is really powerful, especially when you’ve got some good Stand Fasts to keep your models in the game at the end of that. Interestingly enough, dropping the Witch King back down to a Barrow Wight and adding another 5 Orcs was clearly the right call here. His magic would have done very little in this matchup, while the divided nature of the battlefield would have reduced the effectiveness of Harbinger a lot. Having an extra 5 models, on the other hand, was a big part of what let me absorb the early casualties and keep going.

At this point I have taken almost two dozen casualties, and my army still looks huge

Future Changes

Matt is fairly happy with his list as it stands. We’d been discussing dropping one Marauder to bump a Captain up to a Shaman and add 4 Goblins, but that’s a hard sell after this game. They just add so much flexible killing power to the force that it’s hard to move away from them.

My Angmar list is constantly being tinkered with, but I’m fairly happy with its current iteration. I think I might replace two Orcs with another Warg Rider, because that wouldn’t affect my Break Point and would make my offensive force a little more mobile. Moreover, it would help with the flanking manoeuvres that give this army its strength, which would be helpful. Grishna obviously had a bad game, but his March is so pivotal to certain scenarios that I feel like I have to include him. Or at least, I have to include a Captain. I’m not sure Grishna himself will be leading too many more raids…

Not a great moment for him

 

Grishna crawled away from the carnage, desperately seeking cover. All around him were the corpses of his warband, slain by the Goblins or by the huge tunnelling creature that had ambushed their force. He could hear behind him the snarls of the enemy Wargs, busy finishing off the last of his Orcs. Glancing back over his shoulder, he saw that one had sighted him and begun to stalk forward.

Suddenly, it turned back to the west, distracted by a lusty warcry roared from many throats. Grishna saw with elation that the rest of the raiding party had come to his aid, sweeping the remaining Goblins before them and chasing the Wargs off into the deepening gloom. Grishna could hardly believe his luck at this sudden change in his fortunes, and he began to call out for help. A solitary figure detached itself from the celebrating raiders, gliding smoothly across the field towards him. Grishna’s throat caught as the pale face of a Barrow Wight loomed forward out of the darkness.

“Took ya long enough to arrive” he began weakly, before a steel-shod boot slammed into his chest and knocked him onto his back.

He heard a voice, as cold and sharp as death: “You failed, Grishna. Your pack was routed by the Goblins, all because of your weakness.”

Pushing himself up a little, Grishna raised a hand and tried one last time.

“It wasn’t our fault. It was that tentacled monster, it took us by surprise, that’s —"

But his words were cut off by the steel ringing of the Wight drawing its blade.

“The Witch King does not tolerate failure.”

PoV: you're Grishna and you've just failed the Witch King (s729.photobucket)