Battle Report - Harad vs Elves

Sunday was Father's Day, here in the states.  For me it meant a new grill, with a smoker, gaming, family time and no responsibilities.  It was a great day.  The Traveller and I smoked some ribs and brisket and got a game of LotR in during the intermissions.  Sadly, my shade monkey was not out helping me.

The, self described, shade monkey.  It wasn't even Father's Day yet. 

The game was between my Harad, played by the Traveller, and my WiP High Elves/Galadrim list.  I gave the Traveller the Haradrim since he is tired of getting beaten by them.  They are a very difficult army to play well and he learned a lot from this game.

The two armies, playing chicken.

We played domination, with the ruins in the center of the table being the objective.  We got rid of the random deployment as that gets old in every single scenario.  The one exception was rolling a die and on a 1 your warband didn't get to come in.  Of course my General's warband got to sit out the first turn of the game.

The Haradrim begin a general advance, minus their general who was hiding behind a hill.

Erestor had lost the Lady Arwen.  His personal guard was still around him, but the other two thirds of the army, the Lady and her guard and the escort from Lothlorien, were no where to be found.  Worse, the Galadrim had brought word that a force of Haradrim had been raiding in the area.

The sound of battle, to his front, drew Erestor and his elves on at the double.  They entered a valley, home to a small farm.  In the center was a strange pillar.  The other side of the valley was crawling with raiders, and Erestor's sense of dread told him that a Nazgul was out there somewhere too.  As he watched, the Lady Arwen led her company forward to engage the southrons while their wood elf allies advanced in the center, protecting her flank.

The two sides traded arrows, with the Haradrim getting a surprising number of hits, which were mostly deflected by the heavy armor of the elves.  The elvish bows proved much more successful at wounding the lightly armored Haradrim.

The Galadrim and Abrakhan meet in the field.

The Galadrim crossed the fence to meet the middle force, while keeping their archers back and sending two elves to hold the gap between the house and the wall.  Erestor's attention, however, was on the force bearing down on his princess.  The Nazgul finally made an appearance and Erestor ordered his archers to the high ground, where they could try to dissuade him from being too aggresive.  At one point Erestor was sure that an arrow had found it's mark, flying into the hood of the wraith, however it just kept coming forward (stupid fate roll).

Though outnumbered the Galadrim would win this fight.

In the field the wood elf Storm Caller cast Nature's Wrath, knocking the Abrakhan to the ground.  The fight here went against the southrons quickly.  The guards of Lothlorien being determined that their Lady's guest would arrive safely in her realm.

The haradrim line is still holding here, kind of.

On the right the Lady Arwen skillfully maneuvered her force to hold the Haradrim attack while she waited for Erestor and his band to arrive.  Erestor was very grateful that his princess was wise as well as courageous.  With the full weight of elvish numbers, and the Haradrim archers held back (a mistake that the Traveller learned from), the southron line was shattered and the elves surged forward.

The line is not holding so well here.  

Finally, the courage of the men broke and the elves were left in control of the field, with Galadrim archers in command of the strange pillar.  Erestor was looking forward to seeing what interest his Lady had in the artifact, and in getting her to her destination intact.


This was a fun game.  I think there were some good lessons learned.  The Traveller had some horrible dice rolls.  I explained to him that my dice hate him, so he is considering buying some of his own.  It's just common sense really.  One step at a time to get him into the hobby.