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| The White Finger |
Battle Companies earn initiative points for successful
outcomes, and can spend them on mercenaries, Wargear, equipment such as healing
herbs, rope, back packs or they can be used to roll for reinforcements ”from home”.
As a game mechanic in a narrative campaign this feels a little contrived
particularly in this setting of being far from home with enemy territories in
between but I’m sure fits well in normal game play. Anyway, the Finger have
been reinforced several times and now number 13 having accrued two more
berserkers, four more warriors with heavy armour, two of which are toting
crossbows and a feral Uruk Hai. The original members have developed new skills,
notably Ogbad becoming an expert shot with increase shooting stat and Ogzul despite
having a serious arm injury which means he can not use shield, two handed weapon
or bow, becoming an adept duellist with increased fight, defence, might and
courage stats as well as blade master and parry skills.
Scenario 3-The Banks of the Anduin
Having escaped the Forest of Fangorn, the company continues its
trek Northwards towards the Grey Mountains following the banks of the Anduin. As
they travel, the forest of Lothlorien draws ever closer, hemming them against
the Great River. The company has attracted the attention of several bands of wood
elves and it’s not long before arrows begin to fly!
The company enter the table from the Southern edge, the
objective of this scenario is to leave the table from the Northern edge or wipe
out the elves.
There are twelve wood elves, with an assortment of weapons,
and a captain divided evenly between the Northern and Southern halves of the
table
The
Wood Elves emerge from the trees. Despite hitting their targets with remarkable
consistency, the Elven arrows bounced harmlessly form the thick, Uruk armour
Elven
throwing knives had some success in the charge but the Finger cut right through
the unfortunate Elves and barely raised a sweat
And they definitely did not have the luck!
The Finger had three skirmishes with Elves as they
progressed North. This scenario fits well with the narrative, its perfectly
feasible that as the Uruks progress Northward they should have several clashes.
The Warband profited from these encounters, finding a dragons bane sword and an
elf bow!
This game was far too easy for my hardened warriors. I
should have increased the number of the elves or reinforced them with maybe some
armoured kindred or perhaps a hero or two.
A few days later and having crossed the Anduin North of the Gladden
Fields, the company have to choose whether to cross the Carrock or travel through
Mirkwood and risk an encounter with the Elves of Thranduils Kingdom. “Ok, boys, let’s get us some bear skin!”
Scenario 4 -Across the Carrock
It is said the Carrock is protected by groups of strong
woodsmen and that a wild beast in the form of a giant bear roams the woods in search
of Orcs and Goblins. Gorluk is quick to dismiss such rumours. As they push on through
the woods the company becomes aware of singing and happy laughter ahead of them,
they have stumbled upon some woodsmen relaxing at the end of a hard days labour.
This scenario calls for a dozen woodsmen, they have fairly good
stats and are armed with “hand and half axes” that can be used as single or double
handed weapons. I don’t possess any figures that look like this so I used some Lamedonian
light spear men as proxies, mostly because I haven’t used them yet!
The scenario lasts ten turns, if the Woods men are not all slain
then Beorn appears and the whole company roll for injuries.
As it turned out, a dozen Woodsmen are no match for battle company
of this level and they were all dead by turn 5. I didn’t want to replay this scenario
three times as it was too easy, so I changed it to something that I hoped would prove more challenging
Now as the victorious Uruks are enjoying an after-battle
feast, they are in turn ambushed by a patrol of 6 rangers and their journeymen.
They are led by “Albarhad” a ranger captain
The Uruks respond with the only tactic they
know-CHAAAAAARRRGE!
The Rangers prepare to meet the charge
This was an excellent game!
It soon broke down into multiple scraps of small groups fighting
tooth and nail
In the end the better armour of the Orcs won the day and Albarhad,
surrounded and alone, was mercilessly cut down by Gargul
I enjoyed this game a lot. The company found a Great Bow and
a master forged two handed axe ”That’s mine” growled Gargul and nobody argued
Gorluk leads his victorious band even further North deeper into the forest which becomes thicker with taller ,older trees as they travel and darker and now , high in the tree tops above them, long trails of gossamer threads can be seen. Sticky white webs, and in them the scurrying forms of eight legged horrors.
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