Six Armies

A few weeks ago, we managed to get our whole Warmaster group together for a big game.  As I happened to have my camera with me, I decided to take a photograph of the board after each turn.  Unfortunately, I didn't make sufficient notes to provide a detailed battle report, so the details are somewhat sketchy, and in fact only cover the half of the table I played on with any detail at all!

Nevertheless, you should still be able to get a fairly good idea of the feel of the battle, particularly through the pictures.  The pictures, incidentally, were taken with a 35mm automatic under relatively poor lighting conditions.  I've doctored them up slightly, adjusting the contrast and filtering for sharpness.  I aimed for clarity rather than beauty; these look a good deal lower quality than the originals, but the placement of miniatures is a lot easier to make out.

Setup

Our Chaos player has a fantastic gaming room set up in the basement of a large stone farmhouse.  His brother built a plywood frame to cover their pool table, which provides an 8' x 4' (244cm x 122cm) gaming surface.  Unfortunately, the only thing we had handy to cover this with was some old curtains, one green and one blue.  The green one was fine, if somewhat seventies.  The blue would make a beautiful tropical sea, but is pretty eye-rattling as a battlefield.  So with this psychedelic combination, it was off to war.

Our terrain situation isn't the greatest, however, We have a few pieces of home-made terrain, including some lovely heat-melted styrofoam rocky outcroppings and a 10mm-scale forested hill test piece, as well as some relatively straight forward hills with rounded edges (which are completely impractical for Warmaster).  There's also an HO scale card castle (only the keep was used).  Since then I've ordered some Geo Hex, which will look a lot better.

Since most of the miniatures had made it to the table before we began setting up, we decided to leave them on the side they'd been set up on, and do terrain placement by allowing one side to place one piece, then alternating until all of the pieces had been used up.  This is a terrible idea, and I'd recommend against it, since the main goal became to screw up the enemy's deployment line, which led to a very artificial-looking battlefield.

The Armies

Our group had six armies, High Elves, Empire, Dwarves, Chaos, and two armies of Undead.  Most of them were unpainted at the time (which makes it a bit hard to tell in these photographs what the hell they are).

We had decided to play the multiplayer game more or less as if it were two large armies.  Each side had three Generals, and the failure of one had no effect on the other armies, but the actions of each army were resolved simultaneously on a phase-by-phase basis.  This is the best way to do it, IMO, since it prevents long attention-killing waits while you wait for your turn to arrive.

We calculated breakpoint on a per-side basis.  Since then, I've had a five-player game (3 on 2) where it was done on a per-army basis, which is a good way to do it as well.  Since casualties are rarely distributed evenly across the armies making up one side, calculating breakpoint for the whole side tends to mean that the battle is going to end while some players' armies are comparatively healthy.  It does mean, however, that barring complete destruction of your army, you get to play to the end of the battle so long as you have one unit left, which is more inclusive.

The forces of good set up in the west (In this report, I'm arbitrarily calling the blue end of the table the 'North'.), and the forces of darkness set up in the east.  We then strung up some blankets to begin secret deployment.

These photographs are taken from the north (blue), looking south (green).  The forces of good are arranged along the western edge of the battlefield.  Closest is a small Dwarven contingent (~1000 pts), and in the far southwest, a small army of High Elves (~1500 pts).  A ~2500 point Empire army is distributed across most of the table edge.

The forces of darkness were arranged along the eastern edge.  Here you can see about 3000 points of the two Undead armies, and in the far southeast is a compact but powerful 2000 point Chaos army.

Forces of Good Turn One

I'm the High Elf player (in the back there, foolishly leading the way with some Giant Eagles and a Dragon Rider, and I can't tell you what's going on in the north here, but it looks like the Dwarven player is a bit strung out.  A couple of Steam Tanks have made some good progress, and it looks like the Empire player has managed to get his artillery up the steep incline onto the hilltop.  (The reddish blob mid-table is a pack of dice.)

At this point, I gave up on trying to keep track of the whole thing.  For the rest of the battle, the photographs were be taken from the southern end of the table, since this is where my High Elves were positioned.

Forces of Evil Turn One

The first evil turn was fairly conservative - most of the Undead line stayed where it started, safely tucked away from harm behind the sheltering mountain and castle that we had placed to try to mess up their start.  The Chaos player covered some ground.  Here you can see his starting line across its front, from south to north:

• Harpies on his flank;
• Chaos Hounds (grey);
• a Wizard ;
• three units of Chaos Knights supported by a Dragon-riding Hero ;
• and finally two units of Dragon Ogres in the shadow of the keep.
• behind the dragon is his General ;
• in the back are two grey brigades of infantry in column - Warriors leading
  Marauders, each brigade dragging a hissing Chaos Spawn along with it.

You can see the the southern good guys' line more clearly from here as well - from the left:

• a brigade of four infantry units (Archers backed up by Spearmen)
  with some Repeater Bolt Throwers .
• in the valley between the hills some Empire infantry ;
• in front of them a cavalry brigade (two primed Reavers sandwiching
  some painted Tough as Nails Silver Helms , in column, making a T-formation);
• closest to the enemy line, the Dragon Rider and the two units of Eagles ;
• between the Dragon Rider and the cavalry you can make out a
  wingless, unpainted Dragon-riding Hero .
• not visible, off to the left, some Empire Knights and Pistoliers led
  by a Hero on a Griffon ;
• also not visible, off to the left, some Empire Infantry with a Wizard .

Forces of Good Turn Two

In the north, you can see the Empire and Dwarves  The cannons have moved down the eastern slope of the two-level hill, trying to find range to the shy Undead army.  The Gyrocopter is still sitting uselessly on the starting line.

Tuomas wrote in his strategy guide that some Generals are deathly afraid of particular enemy units, and will expend huge resources to try to get rid of them.  I can see now that for me, Dragon Ogres are this unit.  Desperately trying to soften them up before they reached the rest of my army, I sent the Eagles and the two dragons into their flank in a premature attempt to disrupt them.

It worked out okay, costing me one stand of Eagles for two stands of Dragon Ogres in the first round of combat.  To avoid bringing in other units during the pursuit, however, I fell back to the apparent safety of the castle.

My cavalry stayed more or less where it was, and the characters moved up to support the imminent combats (the General on the left of the cavalry, the Wizard on the right).  On the left, you can see the Empire infantry and Knights coming back into view.

Forces of Evil Turn Two

Here the Chaos player begins to pursue conflicting goals.  The undamaged Dragon Ogres and one brigade of infantry are aligned to face the flyers on the castle, while the large briades of Knights continues to move towards the enemy line.  The far northeastern Undead player manges to get most of his army onto the hill, preparing for a made charge into the valley.

Here my miscalculation cost me - the Undead player asked innocently if he could shoot at my flyers atop the castle.  It seemed reasonable, but I wasn't prepared for the resulting onslaught.  Several units of Skeleton Archers, some Chariots, and a unit of Skull Chukkas all laid into them, scattering them to the wind.  The surviving Eagles were driven from the castle, leaving the two Dragons exposed.

Forces of Good Turn Three

At this point the Dwarven player gets moving and sends some Troll Slayers rampaging across the table (in the top right, next to the Zombie Dragon).  The Empire player finally gets his large brigade of infantry out of the valley at our table edge.  I pulled my Dragon Rider back to the hilltop to use it as a reserve, but the Hero failed to save the Eagles from the same fate, leaving them directly in the path of the Dragon Ogres.

Meanwhile, however, we have rallied our missile-capable troops to harass the Chaos Knights.  The Empire's unit of crossbowmen (left, in blue), his Wizard (just past the Chaos Dragon), the High Elf infantry and artillery, the High Elf cavalry, and the High Elf Wizard let loose with everything at the enemy, doing little permanent damage, but successfully splitting the brigade.  (You can see the one unit of painted Knights now in irregular formation from having to move aside, while the third unit of Chaos Knights has been driven back near the grey Chaos Hounds and the lone surviving Dragon Ogre.)

Out of sight, the Empire Knights and Pistoliers have moved up the southern table edge.

Forces of Evil Turn Three

Combat!  Starting from the right, the Dragon Ogres launched into the hapless Eagles, shredding them in a single round of combat.  Mid-table, the Chaos player somehow moved a brigade of Warriors and Marauders up from the back and added to them the Chaos Dragon (formerly with the Knights), into the High Elf cavalry.  The Elves repelled the attack, losing a stand from each of the units of Reavers.

The Chaos Hounds charged through the Empire crossbowmen, cutting them down immediately.  They advanced into the High Elf RBT's, tearing off one stand, but luckly stopping there.  You can just see the surviving stand of Hounds (the one grey stand on the left of the block of painted minis) just off the flank of the remaining RBT stand.

In the south, the Chaos Knights bounced off the two-unit brigade of Empire Knights.  In the east, Undead infantry have climbed atop the castle to waggle their bows threateningly.

Forces of Good Turn Four

In the south, the Empire Knights brigade, supported by the Griffon-riding Hero, charged the leading unit of Chaos Knights and defeated them.  In the rear, a unit of High Elf spearmen have peeled away from the brigade to begin the frustrating process of trying to kill the last unit of Chaos Hounds, with little success (infantry can't pursue cavalry).  I should have used the RBT.

Combined archery from the High Elf Reavers and Archers did a lot of damage to the Chaos infantry that had charged them the previous turn, wiping out the Warriors knocking a stand from the Marauders, and separating the Spawn from the brigade.

Mid table, a brigade of Empire infantry was left with its flank facing the enemy dragon ogres.

More Action

I must have forgotten to take one or more photos here, so as best I can tell this next picture represents the state after Good's fifth turn, leaving out a photo for Evil turn four.

Mid-table, you can see that the Chaos infantry near the castle has moved up, and the Dragon Ogres have moved in and squashed the whole brigade of Empire infantry.  The High Elf cavalry, just to the left of that, seem to have taken some damage; the right unit of Reavers having been destroyed.  In the west, the Chaos Hounds are still harassing the High Elf Spearmen, who have lost a stand in the fighting.

In the south, the Empire Knights have been been nearly entirely wiped out, and the brigade of Pistoliers is seriously threatened by Chaos Marauders.

At this point, it becomes clear that casualties in the north between the Undead, Dwarf and Empire players are mounting rapidly (you can see some of the expanding Empire dead pile left of the red Dragon Rider), and in fact are dangerously close to losing the game - for both sides!  The organization of both sides falls apart completely, and a war of attrition breaks as both sides make a desperate pitch to reach the other side's breakpoint.

Mid-table, the Silver Helms charged forward into the lone unit of Marauders, pushing them back past the Spawn, and cutting them down in the pursuit.  In the south west, Chaos starts wailing on the Empire cavalry, killing the surviving two stands of Empire Knights and decimating the brigade of Pistoliers.

Below is the photo taken just before the last turn of the game.  The forces of evil needed to destroy two units to reach our breakpoint, and we needed to destroy five.  We were within a hair's breadth of making our quota.  You can see the Dragon Rider and Dragon-mounted Hero, lined up to charge the lone surviving Dragon Ogre, and on the left, two units of Elven Archers, the Wizard, and the remaining stand of the RBT are lined up to shoot at a two-stand unit of Undead Chariots threatening the Empire Cannons.

Bitter Defeat

Below is the final layout of the game.  The Dragons have failed to reach their target, the Elves failed to destroy the Chariots.  Elsewhere, the forces of darkness were able to destroy one last exhausted unit of troops, reaching our breakpoint.

So that's it!  The Forces of Darkness won the day in a war of attrition.  Having recently read Tuomas' strategy guide for Warhammer, I can see that both sides operated with fairly little regard to an overall strategy, and were easily side-tracked from their objectives.

The whole battle took about seven hours to play out, partly due to the difficulty of keeping that many people resolving smoothly, particularly when one army spans most of the table (Empire, in this case), requiring that player to resolve with three of the enemy players.  I've played a four-player game with 3,000 points per side since then, and that went significantly faster.

Nevertheless, it was a complete blast!  Future games, however, will definitely either be smaller battles, or have objectives to make them more purposeful.

If you have any questions or comments, feel free to drop me a line at michael@trilemma.com, or make a post on the Warmaster eGroup at http://www.e-groups.com/group/gw-warmaster.  I'd love to hear if you learned anything or got any ideas from this narrative, or whether its informal nature makes it useless for that.

All of this crap is Copyright © 2000-2006 Michael Prescott except
the registered trademarks of Games Workshop.