Warhammer The Old World - Chaos v Empire

Kenton bought his Chaos Hordes around to the Sherwood Soldier Shack for some more square based proper Warhammer.

In the run up there had been talk of Orcs and Goblins and a Gob Off and suchlike but in the end we both went with armies we were at least slightly familiar with.

Standard pitched battle approach, 2,000 points.

Kenton had put all his Khaos hordes in one Korner. He'd Kastled! Which rather left my knights out on a limb.

Wild hairy doom mongers held my centre (that was actually effectively my right flank.)

The Wissenland Whitespears barred the way to the cannon - they would move up to give "Owd Betty" a clear line of sight.

The Hammers of Ulric stood ready, screened by their crossbow detachments.

You see - a Khorney Khaos Khastle.

The thin blue and white line.

The brave archers of Stirland set out to make a nuisance of themselves to frenzied Khorne warriors.

the Knights duly entangled themselves in the trees. But other Angry Red Men marched forward.

Whilst the Dragon Ogre waved his huge chopper about.

Shortly after this some sort of foul Chaos magic caused the Wissenland Whitespears to become the Wissenland Brown Trousers and they ran completely away. Which was something of a blow.

The men of Middenheim however retained their dignity (and the colour of their trews).

The Daemon Prince moved up toward the brave men of Stirland. I made a mental note to not forget to move them in my next turn. Regular readers are invited to guess how that turned out.

The Nurgleblokes turned to protect the chaos flank.

Where some wild and woolly men were approaching.

The knights were still stuck in a hedge.

As the Men of Middenheim held firm.

Oh look - those archers I knew it was really important to move...

Stirland thanks you for your service.

On my left Angry Hairy Red Men (mine) charged Angry Hairy Red Men on foot.

Chop, thunk, whap!

The pistoliers, with crushing inevitability, failed their  impetuous test and unwisely charged the Nurgleblokes.

With the Stirlanders reduced to Smearlanders the Knights yomped into the Manly Men of Middenheim. After they'd had a few Helblaster shots in the face!

Frantically the Wizard recited the words to the Oakenshield spell.

The wild and woolly men were closing on the Nurgleblokes

K'mt'n the Daemon Prince roared from the hilltop.

The Knights found the buffed Veterans a bit chewy.

A second unit of Khorne warriors acted as Helblatser magnets. While the trolls, too far from K'nt'n, blundered about a bit.

The Flagellants gave a good account of themselves against the Nurgleblokes, so the Prince had to get involved. Finally the knights arrived to avenge the hot-headed pistoliers.

This was the inevitable result. Hurrah for not running away though!

The Dragon Ogre had killed some handgunners and now returned ready to kill the crew of "Owd Betty".

With a cry of "Grapeshot!" furiously the men of the Empire forced nuts, screws and whatever other objects they could lay hand on into Betty's cavernous hole!

They lit the fuse expecting to destroy the foul beast of chaos...

Tragically they'd overstuffed the venerable old girl and she exploded in a hail of molten metal!

The Hairy Red Angry Men of the Empire having dealt with one lot of Hairy Angry Red Men on foot found still more to feast on!

As the Knights slowly ground down the Veterans but were also slowly pushed back.

*breaks fourth wall* For the record Give Ground is a stupid and pointless complication of the rules that serves no purpose beyond slowing down the game.

Look, the Hammermen are about 4" further on to the table than where they started. How incredibly exciting.

K'nt'n the Daemon Prince having murdered the final Woollyman decided to deal with the Kniggits.

Look, 2" further back everyone! Brilliant, edge of the seat stuff. How do they do it?

Finally the White Wolvses were able to come to the rescue of the Veterans and wipe out the last of the Khorne Khniggits.

Sadly it was not enough and the victory went to K'nt'n!

A good fun game with excellent company.

TOW is "alright". It's a bit fussy and complicated and therefore slow. I guess all the kids want granularity, but I'm long past the stage where complexity adds pleasure to a game. I guess I'm not the target audience - but I'm struggling to see who is, if it's not middle aged nostalgia merchants with plentiful disposable income like me. It certainly doesn't seem to be aimed at new players. Ho hum

As Kenton said  afterwards playing the game doesn't really leave you feeling like you are excited to paint some more soldiers. Older versions of WFB used to do that for me.

Still we'll no doubt keep plugging away - these armies won't play themselves you know and any Wrahammer is better than no Warhammer.