Good Monsters vs Hasharin Trio - To The Death!

Well, thanks for your patience, my uni subject this semester was brutal and I used pretty much all my spare time on it.

But... finished my last assignment now and today was my first day off - what better way to spend it than brushing off the old miniatures and going to battle against my brother! A long overdue Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game Battle Report yay!

Remember you can click on images for a bigger version.

Anyway, off we go - I had an army of six. That's right, just six =) My Good-guy monster army. Three giant eagles, two ents and Radagast the Brown. The turns were fast and furious given how few combats there could be, so we were done much more quickly than usual (though it still took two hours with our photo taking and having forgotten so much in the last several months). We rolled a random scenario and got To The Death. Subtle.

775 points a side in the end, here's my army: Radagast the Brown, mounted on stag (just counts as a horse). Leaf-fall (counts as Treebeard), Shybark (ent), Barukshathur (counts as Gwaihir), Sky-Wolf (the down low eagle) and White-Beak (because I can't think of a good name for him).

My brother had plenty of guys to throw at me, 39 in fact. Here The Betrayer leads a force of mounted troops. In the background you can see a warband full of spearmen led by a Hasharin.

And here you can see another warband of archers in the foreground, led by a Hasharin.

And my brother borrowed the latest Hasharin I painted so that he had a warband full of Watchers of Karna led by him. That's right THREE Hasharin. Nasty stuff! With three attack dice and a re-roll in the event of a fail to wound, these guys are vicious! 

Turn 1 - Priority Harad.

Radagast casts the spell that gives him terror, so now every single one of my models has terror. During the course of the match we gave up counting how many men failed the tests to charge into combat =) Fortunately for my brother, with lots of spearmen he only had to get a few guys in and then back them up.

Leaf-fall is charged by two spearmen, his long arms smash through the men, sweeping them aside in a splintering of bones. Behind him White-Beak's razor sharp talons rend the flesh from another spearman, sending him out of the fight, on his other flank Sky-Wolf pounces down to tear the life from still another human, blood splashing over the ground.

Barukshathur is assailed by four Watchers of Karna and a blue-clad Hasharin, but the sweeping wings blast back the humans and two Watchers fall to the Great Eagle's flashing talons. Shybark is not accustomed to combat, and backs off in the face of two Watchers of Karna, the flashing blades dazzling him.

The raiders charge up the hill and through the ruins, heading towards the back of the massive creatures.

Turn 2: Priority Good.

The Betrayer falls back in the line of charging cavalry, sets his sights on White-Beak and transfixes the Great Eagle!

Magical energies befuddling the great beast, four spearmen press the attack, but fail to do more than ruffle some feathers. Apart from Radagast, all of my models had three wounds and 8 defence!

Leaf-fall strides forward, one massive foot slamming down and crushing the banner-bearer while a massively heavy branched arm swipes out and smashes another spearman into some nearby rocks. Using all his might he also strikes out at the Hasharin, who uses two fate to escape serious injury in a series of leaps and tumbles.

Here's an aerial view of some highly amusing combat. The dead men at the foot of the willow, Shy-bark, are there due to getting some arrows in their backs. The archers, urged on by the Hasharin nearby, fired at the ent, hitting multiple times, but not causing any wounds. Some of the shots were impeded by the soft flesh of their comrades. Ahhh, evil side armies. Barukshathur is assailed by a Watcher and the blue Hasharin. Radagast casts a spell and immobilises the blue Hasharin, the Giant Eagle is so focused on this that the Watcher momentarily escapes his notice and strikes - fate is not with the eagle and blood is spilt! Sky-Wolf pounces down, having swept across the battlefield to fell a Watcher.

Turn 3: Priority Good.

Charging to battle another evil man, Shy-bark lift his creaking arm high, only to have the human fall with an arrow in his throat. Turning in surprise another series of arrows thunk into the solid bark - one finds a particularly sensitive spot, causing a bellow of rage to escape from the normally placid ent. (Yes, my brother had to roll to hit, roll an "in the way" due to the Harad guy, then he rolled double sixes to get the wound!) Barakshathur is again beaten back, this time he concentrates on the Watcher who wounded him last turn, but the Hasharin slides in behind the Eagle and slices upwards, gashing the great beast. Radagast casts heal, but fails.

Sky-wolf, having flown across the battlefield again, is transfixed by The Betrayer! Even so, the spears of the Haradrim men cannot cause any damage. Leaf-fall again uses a point of might against the Hasharin and a spearman, fate is with the Hasharin again as he spins and ducks to avoid a mighty blow that instead pounds the spearman into the ground. White-beak swoops over the battlefield and dives down slashing, opening the throats of another two warriors.

Turn 4: Priority Haradrim.

The Betrayer points with his evil sword and summons a black dart, using some might he enforces his will and spears through the chest of the valiant Eagle, Sky-Wolf wounding it. 

White-Beak soars up and over the ruins before gliding and swooping in on the rear of the cavalry convoy, slaying two men who had failed their courage test to charge him!

Enraged by the sorcerous attack, the eagle redoubles its attacks on the nearby humans, they faced their fears and charged it, but their fears had been well founded and two more humans fall, blood and entrails messing up the ground. 

Shy-bark is beset upon by a Hasharin, his combat inexperience telling as the black-clad Hasharin beats him back, poison working even on the thick sappy blood of the ent, who takes another wound.

Barukshathur is healed by Radagast, the invigorating energy strengthening his attacks against the blue Hasharin and allowing him to score a devastating wound against the fast-moving human.

Turn 5: Priority Haradrim.

White-Beak continues his ravaging rampage against the horse-men, felling another two.

Radagast heals Shy-Bark who fends off the black-clad Hasharin but fails to wound the spry human (rolling his second triple-2 of the game!)

The Betrayer black-darts Sky-Wolf, wounding him as he attacks a spearman, the dart causing him to veer slightly and fail to injure the lucky human. Leaf-fall is solely focused on the purple-clad Hasharin now and no amount of acrobatic skill can fully protect the human, who takes a massive blow to his chest, cracking some ribs. 

Barukshathur savagely mauls the blue-clad Hasharin, but fate is on his side and all that happens is his cloaks get torn and shredded (two fate saves!)

Turn 6: Priority Good.

The Haradrim force has been broken and 5 humans run from the field.

White-beak fells yet another raider, almost single wingedly defeating the raider warband. Shy-bark is healed again by Radagast, but the invigoration fails to help him cause a mortal blow on either of the humans that are attacking him .

Two Hasharii and a Watcher of Karna gang up on Barukshathur, who falls beneath the multitude of blows (the last two dice of all the rolls are wounds - I thought I'd made it!)

Sky-Wolf takes out another spearman, dodging a black dart from The Betrayer, leaving only the purple Hasharin on that side of the battlefield. After an epic battle with the mighty ent, the Hasharin is the one who falls at the end. 

Turn 7: Priority Good.

Two more humans run, seeing one of the Hasharin fall.
Radagast heals Shybark again, who clobbers a Serpent Raider to the ground.

White-Beak, avenging his leader, takes on two Hasharii a Raider and a Watcher of Karna and sweeps the Hasharii back before killing the other two men.

Victory points are tallied - Victory Good!

It looked like a complete massacre from the battle report, but without Radagast's heals I would have lost three of my monsters! That would have made for a VERY different game if that had happened. 

Here are some of the shots that I thought added to the fun:

Friendly fire view:

As my brother said, he killed three of his own men (about 18 points worth) to do a wound to an ent (arguably about 40 points worth!)

At one point The Betrayer and Radagast eyed one another off...

The Betrayer missed one spell, a Black Dart that would have killed Sky-Wolf. Radagast didn't appear to contribute much until I added up all the wounds he'd healed!

The remnants of the Evil squad:

The victors!

Sorry for the relative brevity of the descriptions, but although my study is finished, my almost 2 year old isn't =)

Looking VERY forward to playing some more battles over the Christmas break!