The Grudgebook of Karak Silvertop (Dwarves)

Dwarf Turn 2

Having moved safely out of range of the Skullcrushers, both the Gyrocoptor and Rangers turned back to face the enemy lines.

The Bomber on that flank swooped low over the Juggernaut riding warriors, commencing its bombing run. The explosive fizzled as it fell from the bomber (huzzah two misfires out of two…) and the dud canister unceremoniously bounced off the helmet of the central rider.

The second bomber attempted a more audacious move, targeting the sorcerer and his Marauder horse guard, knowing that if his accuracy was off, he might have to deal with a lot of angry Longbeards. He mopped a bead of sweat from his brow in relief, as his aim was true and one of the horsemen was blown from his mount. The Sorcerer remained unharmed as his charmed shield bore the brunt of the explosion.

The Grudgethrower crew weren’t ones to not look a gift horse in the mouth and immediately followed up with a pin point shot, pancaking the chaos wizard, with the last of the marauder horsemen ripped apart by the ensuing shrapnel.

The advanced Gyrocopter moved to the flank of the marauders and 12 of the northmen fell screaming as the superheated steam boiled them alive.

In the centre of the battle, the Clansmen tore into the flank of the Dragon Ogres to back up their older brethren. Three of the great beasts were slain but not before they laid low the dwarf BSB. The remaining Dragon Ogres fled with the Longbeards hard at their heels but the doughty dwarves failed to catch them, something they would rue. The Clansmen chose not to pursue and reformed to face the now inevitable charge from the Norsicans.







SPLAT! And then there was no magic phase.







Ta da! Enter the miners



Warriors Turn 2

Seeing the flank of the Longbeards exposed, the Slaughterbeast didn’t hesitate and crashed into the veteran warriors, tearing a double handful apart. Shrugging off the injuries, which were nothing compared to what chaos mutants in their day used to cause, they disdained to even turn and face the beast.

The Dragon Ogres, hearing that pursuit had stopped, turned back to face their foes, looking for some payback.

In the centre of the battlefield the Trolls, once again failed to reach the horde of dwarves. Not so the Marauders, who ran full tilt into the warriors flails swinging. Their momentum came to an abrupt halt in the face of the dwarf stoicism and even with Sigvald bolstering them, managed to cut down a paltry rank. In return, 17 of their number were brutally cut down (Luke utterly whiffed their attacks!).

The Khorne worshippers moved up through the woods ready to support the central combat, suffering damage from the unstable terrain in the process.

On the far flank, the chariot again charged the rangers. Their shots were more effect this time with one of the steeds bellowing in pain as a bolt penetrated its barding. With crushing force, dwarves were thrown aside as it impacted, the chaos warriors further adding to the damage, as the dwarf lines bowed. In return, their great weapons tore chunks out of the chariot before they turned tail and fled, closely followed by the dark warriors.

The depleted Hellstriders were unable to emulate the chariots success, finding the Gyrocoptor a much tougher proposition.





Hold, HOLD!

Run away!

Dwarf Turn 4

In an effort to disrupt the upcoming charge, the last of the bombers, ploughed into the rear of the dragon ogre. Sadly it was for nought, as the ogre turned and casually swotted the flyer out of the air.

Still laughing with enjoyment, Sigvald continued to kill the dwarves around him. His laugh momentarily ceased as they finally managed to inflict a wound in return. The dogs were slowly being whittled down but Sigvald ensured they weren’t going anywhere.

The only other combats involved the Chariot and Hellstriders eliminating the last of the dwarven presence on the rest of the battlefield.

The Dwarf situation was looking perilous!







Warriors Turn 4

Calling out the Warrior champion, Sigvald quickly dispatched him and then spun and skewered a group of miners that had got too close. Incensed, the Prospector jammed his steam drill into the Chaos Champion, causing him to scream as it ripped into his torso.

The miners then staggered as the trolls hit the rear of the unit, the monstrous infantry clubbing the stunties to the ground. It didn’t go all their own way as one of their number fell, pierced with multiple mining picks.

On the other side of the ongoing combat, the Slaughter brute and remaining Dragon Ogre charged into the rear of the warriors. Having been the brunt of horrendous casualties and with their nerve shaken by the two monsters in their rear, they promptly failed their fear test. The further deaths inflicted proved too much for the warriors who ran but managed to outdistance their pursuers.

At that point we called it as the club had a hard close.







Result

A resounding win for the warriors as they scored 1,800 Victory Points, vs the Dwarves 862 Victory Points.



Post-game thoughts.

We’ve played each other and Warhammer enough times that we are not adverse to bringing fluffier options in our lists. I was itching to try out a vanguard/ambushing list as something different and had kept quiet about it so it would be a surprise to Luke (and it was).

The general premise of the list worked well. The Rangers did their job, blocking Luke’s vanguarding, so that my units could move up unimpeded, to the centre of the board, and so the points invested in the strollaz banner runes weren’t wasted! This in turn meant that when the miners arrived, they were in a good position to charge in.

However, there were a few issues that swiftly became apparent. Moving the units up, put them in a prime position to be charged on the first turn. It was only down to some terrible rolling on Luke’s behalf that none of his units made combat (bar the Dragon Ogres). If the bulk of his forces had made combat, especially the trolls and marauders into the great weapon warriors, then he would have had time to then turn and face the miners.

This nicely brings me to the next point. A horde of miners looks fantastic and you can’t ignore that kind of threat appearing behind your lines, but it’s a lot of points in one unit, almost a fifth of the army. It can’t come on until turn 2 and cannot move/charge until turn 3. In a game of only 6 turns, that many points off the board, can put you at quite the disadvantage. You’d probably be better off bringing another vanguarding horde that would be on the table from the get go.

There were a few small errors I made too. The most obvious is that I should have used the Gyrobomber to block/redirect the Slaughterbrute so it wasn’t able to flank the Longbeards. I didn’t, mostly as I was single minded about using them to bomb/shoot things and again this nicely brings me onto the next thing:

The Gyrobombers. I’d been determined to take 2 as 1 had never panned out. They performed as I expected, poorly. Their issue is down to points vs effectiveness and probably, that other things in the army do its job far more effectively. The Gyrocoptor is 60pts cheaper and although the flame template is smaller, it doesn’t scatter and so you know what you are going to hit. A fully tooled up Grudge thrower is 30pts more expensive and although it uses the small template, you can reroll the scatter and misfire and the strength of the hits is higher. Both of these are just more reliable than the bomber. It’s a shame as I really want to like it.

What did take me back, was how incredibly hard it was to kill Sigvald the ‘magnificent pain in my backside’. I actually got through his armour surprising well but his regen was another thing. Writing much of this around a month after the game, I also think we got his WS wrong. I’m sure most of the time I’d been rolling 5’s to hit him with the miners and warriors but it should have been 4’s as he was weapons skill 8 rather than 9. That said, it made writing the report much more fun!

I have to give Luke credit though, he played a solid game (as I’d expect with him using his warriors). It was great to face some of the less seen units on the board. If we’d continued, I have no doubt that the dwarves would have been tabled by the end of turn 5. A terrible day and once again, Luke’s name has been added into the Karak Silvertop Book of Grudges! (And in case you are wondering, yes I actually do have a Grudge Book for the army)!

Nice one, thanks for uploading. Two very brightly painted armies! Great to see those classic chaos models in action.. And of course any excuse to get the marauder giant on the tabletop..