Battle of the Pelennor Fields using War of the Sundered Realms Rules.

 

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.

Battle of the Five Armies AAR using War of the Sundered Realms.

The battle of the 5 armies is one of those iconic battles from fantasy literature. I have wanted to play it for years but never got round to it.

When I first read Tolkien in the 70s I though they were the best books ever and as soon as I learned that wargames figures were available I started to buy them.

I still have many of them and many fought in this battle.

I’ve collected fantasy figures for years on and off so I easily had enough for this battle.

The issue for me with fantasy wargaming has always been about finding a suitable set of rules. I’ve tried various sets over the years but none has really inspired me. I was never a fan of Warhammer as I felt it too slow for the scale of battles I wanted to do.

I liked a lot about Kings of War but there were 3 features about it I did not like –

The IGOUGO system which meant one side could pretty much shatter the other in one turn;

The lack of attrition – there is no reduction to a units performance as it takes damage which I think is daft;

The one sided combat.

Looking for an alternative I found these free rules on the web. The have some resemblance to KOW but deal with all the issues that I don’t like about that system. It’s a fast play system, based on a Tolkienesque world (clearly intended to avoid any copyright issue) which gives you the rules and the army lists.

https://cruciumgiger.blogspot.com/2020/08/war-of-sundered-realms.html

So Battle of Fives Armies using War of the Sundered Realms – how did it go?

Really well  - the attraction doing this battle is the variety of races involved which is a good try out for the rules. The other thing I should say here is that I did minimal preparation for this game – I did not work out the points totals for the armies, look closely at the stats, or set any objectives. I did not even make a mountain but just improvised one.

Despite these failings it was a really good game which went like the battle in the Hobbit pretty much and most importantly demonstrated that this is a really good set of rules. Thanks again to Ed for playing what was an experimental game.

I did make a couple of changes to the rules. So troops on higher group get +1 to their defense – this is important for this battle. The other thing I changed was the combat system. Under my change both units attack and defend, but the charger gets a +1 to his attacks. This worked well.

Now on to the battle report.

Initial set up. Dwarves are on the far spur, the Lakemen and Elves on the nearer one. I did not have many goblin wolfriders so used chariots instead.

The view from the mountain.

Elf archers shoot down a goblin unit but are then ridden down by wolf riders. Bard is on the left of the picture.

On the right flank, dwarf warriors make short work of their opponents.

The lakemen on the left flank are in trouble...

With both Lakemen units and both Elf archer units gone, the remaining elves try to hold the position. Gandalf uses the single spell he is allowed for the game to fry the wargs advancing on the elf spearmen.

On the other flank, the dwarfs come down off the ridge to attack the gobiln wolfriders who have been peppering them with arrows.

Four units of night goblins come round the back of the mountain, attacking the elves in the rear. its the end for the elves, but Bard and the elf prince are still fighting. Thorin and company break out of the mountain and move to join in the battle.

It was all looking grim for the allies, but then the eagles arrive and start making mincemeat of the goblins. The eagles are plastic toys off ebay.

Beorn also turns up and stomps the nearest unit of night goblins.

Night goblins charge Thorin's company in the flank and are well and truly thumped for their trouble.

Thorin and bodyguard rashly charge a unit of orcs.

Gandalf and Bilbo fall to a furious troll. I should have made him a High Wizard instead of a Hedge Wizard in which case he would have had the troll for breakfast rather than the other way around.

Bard also fall to a troll. 4 trolls was too many considering how powerful they are and of course in the book there are none in the battle.

The dwarves are still holding on, but Dain is about to fall to another troll in the centre of the picture.

On the left flank, the elven prince is still fighting!

Eagles swoop down on the flank of the orc unit saving Thorin who has been reduced to 1 wound.

Eagles rampage over the battlefield though they have taken quite a few wounds by now.

By now both sides had been reduced to a handful of units and we decided to call it a day. It had been a really exciting game with the balance swinging from one side to another.

I had not set any victory conditions, probably these should have been based on number of heroes slain and taking the mountain and the spurs. The allies lost Dain, Gandalf, Bard, while Thorin and the elf prince survived. The goblin leaders avoided combat until the end of the game!!! Typical. 

The elf prince was a legend, fighting throughout the battle. The allies still held one of the spurs and the mountain, so I guess a draw with the advantage to the goblins. Giving the goblins 4 trolls was probably too many.

So the battle played very much like the book, and the rules worked really well, I had no quibble with them at all. They are just right for large game set in the land of Middle Earth. Highly recommended.