So after the success of the last game I was very keen to try
the war of the Sundered Realms rules again. So for the next game I decided to
go for another classic battle from Middle Earth.
https://cruciumgiger.blogspot.com/2020/08/war-of-sundered-realms.html.
This time it would be the legendary battle off the Pelenor
fields. I can still remember my excitement when I read the account of this
battle in the Return of the King when I was a teenager - which is a very long
time ago. We used the army list from the war of the Sundered Realms.
This time I decided that this would be an objective based
game rather than just a head on battle. Considering that the objective of the
riders of Rohan was to drive off the Mordor forces I thought that capturing
territory would be a good benchmark for success. So I placed six objective
markers on the table in front of the walls of Minas Tirith, each one of these
was worth one point to either side in addition either side could score points
for killing an enemy character. There were three characters on the good side each
worth one point there were two characters on the evil side one worth one point
and one was two points.
This was not the full battle as I wanted it to play out in an afternoon, so the landings from Harlond did not figure in the game.
The game started with the riders of Rohan already on the board and ready to attack the flank of the Mordor army with the men of Gondor still in the citadel.
In the event the game played really well initially the
riders of Rohan used archery soften up the orcs but the Mordor player was
having none of this and quickly turned his orcs to face and charged wherever he
could rather than stand and be peppered. Even though the orcs stood no chance
in combat their job was to hold up the riders of Rohan until the men of the
South could come forward.
The men of Gondor came out of the citadel as quickly as they
could but suffered severely from southern archery fire not helped by me
misreading the table and giving the men of the South too many shots!
It did not take long for the riders of Rohan to dispose of the
orcs but not without casualties. In the meantime the men of the South moved to
intercept the men of Gondor and to face off against the riders of Rohan. The
advantage of numbers despite poor quality meant that the men of the South
defeated the men of Gondor, on the other side of the table the men of the South
successfully blocked the advance of the riders of Rohan.
The characters on both sides stayed out of the action until
the end of the game. The final score was that the good forces scored three
points the Evil forces five points. It was a really good game and another
successful outing for these excellent rules. We found that archery was very
effective and we might reduce its effectiveness in future by reducing range and
adding a pip to the score needed to hit.
Despite the size of the forces involved the game played out in around 4 hours, testament to the playability of this excellent set of rules.
The table at the start of the game. The siege towers and trebuchets are fluff and have no effect on the game.
A closer view. The figures in the foreground are 1970s castings bought when I was at school.
The Rohirrim arrive.
Orcs vs men of Rohan.
Southrons turn to confront the Rohirrim. The terrain cloth is from Dunelm (its green but it was very sunny so it looks paler than it is), the Mumak from Poundland.
The men of Gondor sally out from the city to support the Rohirrim.
The king's guard cavalry destroy another enemy unit. This unit destroyed about half a dozen Mordor units before it went down in the process of destroying a unit of Southrons.
The kings guard finish off a unit of Mordor cavalry which have been badly hit by archery fire.
A Southron unit is flanked and destroyed, but inflicts significant casualties. This is another unit from the 70s which has fought on many a battlefield.
A Poundland Mumak, on loan from the Carthaginian army.
Mumaks and the Witch King line up against the Rohirrim.
Old Britain's toy Mumak in the flank - ouch!
The King's Guard run down yet another unit.
Now its the Mumak's turn to receive a flank charge.
The Witch King gets stuck in.
Theoden, Eomer and Eowyn all attack a lone Nazgul. Undeterred, he kills one and holds off the other two until the end of the game.
The end of the game. The Nazgul is still fighting. After the end of the game we played the combat through and the two Rohan heroes did eventually manage to finish him off.
