Edge of the Abyss

Mine and Matt's first attempt at doing a bit of campaign KoW.

Matt is very new to KoW this being his third game and I have a played a few more but not much better at it.

Standard Tuesday night toy soldiers at Bag of Bones in Plymouth.

Set up with Brotherhood at the top of the pic and Salamandes at the bottom.

From left to right I have a regiment of Order of Brotherhood with a troop of villein recon chaffing it up in front of them. I have my devoted with Heal(6) near by. Next is my Adjutant with bane chant lute. two hordes of Bowmen. Villein rangers (sharpski's rifles) and 2 ballistas (canollistas) and forsaken exemplar.

Matt has his kaisenor lancers on the left. then a salamander horde with 2 shooty geko troops and nearby a standard bearer. then his stegadon (tough as nails) and ancients on rhinos/lizards supported by a mage with heal and fireballs.

Salamanders cavalry on the left shuffled back a bit (coward!). The horde moved forward slightly and the gekkos moved up into firing range. on the right all his big hitters moved forward as far as possible. a bit of shooting put some wounds on my rangers and a cannon.

If the image is bad Matt took them on his phone! (slopping that blame)

on the left i threw my chaff recon cavalry as far forward as possible, moved my characters up to support and put the chaff recon behind the lake (which we were playing as impassable) hoping to get flanks later on. the rifle horde in the middle (the big blob of unpainted white!) moved forward and pivoted to get some shots at the scary big stuff flying down my right flank next turn. i fired at his ancients but the canillistas missed but the rifles plinked a few wounds. the unmoved horde plinked a couple of wounds on the gekkos in the middle of the park.

Salamanders cav on the left flank decide to just charge the chaff and hope for the best they die horribly to spear stabs and lizard bites. the ancients cav on the right advance out of firing sight and
range of all my guns (bows) and cannons (ballistas). the steggadon moves forward slowly and takes a shot at my lord who takes a couple of wounds. the horde in the center hangs back worried about being shot at.

The order of the brotherhood, free of chaff, take there chance and charge the kaisenor lancers, but only manage to waiver. If only the bane chant had come off! i hold my last villein recon not wanting to be side charged by the clan lord (mistake!) the bowmen horde in the middle move up in to the woods for cover and better firing arcs and now the salamander horde is in range. i manage to shoot away the gekkos in the center of the table with my other bowmen horde. both cannons miss again. My exemplar lord, seeing a metric tonne of ancients coming at him decides to valiant fly over the top of them out of charge arcs from them and the steggadon (legend!).

on the left nothing moves due to being wavered from the brotherhood knights charge. in the center the salamanders horde moves forward. the gekkos shoot my cannons some more from up on the hill. the ancients swing about for some charges next turn. the steggadon moves forward and misses its shooting.

The brotherhood knights charge again and with bane chant this time finish of the lancers. my villein recons cant do much because the clan lords shooting wavered them and this happened all game with my healer healing them and them wavering again! the 2 bowmen hordes and both cannons fire at the salamander horde and hit! i believe they took 15ish wounds! but my nerve roll sucked to balance it all out. my exemplar forsaker, seeing the danger of the ancients, valiantly leapt behind the ancients to surprise them in my next turn while they were busy eating whatever they charged in their turn.

the clan lord on the left dances around my knights and shoots the villein recon wavering them again! the gekkos shooting kills one cannon and the ancients charge the other. they both die. after checking his options matt decides he would prefer a rear charge from the villein rangers than the exemplar forsaker and reforms them to face the flying lord. the steggadon and mage move up.

The brotherhood knights decide to ignore the clan lord and head for the center just in case everything goes wrong. recon still wavered.......the 2 horde of bowmen finish of the big horde of salamanders (phew). the rangers rear charge the ancients and do 1 wound from 30 dice (dammit!). the exemplar charges their front, knowing if he doesn't route them he is going to get steggadon in his backside. he does 5ish wounds . i need 7 to rout them and there's no inspiring nearby. 7? that's average on 2d6, safe as houses. i got this. i roll a 6. guess they're dead next turn. (sigh).

Clan lord dances round my recon and wavers them again with shooting (fml). the ancients charge the rangers. the steggadon rear charges my lord. the lord dies massively. like overkill dies. the ancients do 6 wounds on my rangers and with a bit of self inspiring manage only to waiver! woop go team! the hordes are safe another turn!

i move my knights up as fast as i can but all these woods make going flat out at a desirable angle difficult. the white bowmen horde move to face the steggadon next turn. the other horde of bowmen manage to wound and kill the ancients! one down and its only turn 5! next the steggadon. the rangers move back a bit because they're badly wounded and there's a giant dinosaur coming at them! I also rush my characters with heal and bane chant over just in case.

Salamanders only threat really now is the steggadon. but to be fair it is very threatening! he charges the rangers and finishes the badly wounded unit. then advances and manages to get out of my firing arc! is that enough? could there be a 7th turn?

I continue to rush my knights and characters across. the adjutant gets himself between the two hordes giving them both inspiring. but fails his bane chant on the white horde who fire at the steggadon and fail to wound. oh well. time to weather the storm.

the steggadon charges the bowmen horde who take 9 wounds. luckily their 19/21 nerve holds out and they are fine.

seeing that kills mean prizes Matt charges the clan lord at the recon hoping to finally kill them, he does 4 wounds and without inspiring....they waiver again! but it's a good thing this time!

Having cunningly (modest) maneuvered my forces so the knight were within range of the front of my bowmen horde i multi-charge the steggadon. he takes a beating doing 10ish wounds but laughs at my attempts to break his nerve with the nearby inspiring wizard helping out. Copying Matt my horde fires at the gekkos trying to get a late game kill but no luck. they take 1 wound and only waiver.

It's all over:

Brotherhood - 775 points killed
Salamanders - 600 points killed

very close! only 25 points make the victory.

very good game and so near to being the other way round. on reflection i feel i should've flank deployed with my shooting against an edge and my cavalry on the other side of it.

Matt is getting better and nowhere near a finished list. more like trying his old stuff from that dead blown up world and seeing what he likes so i expect closer games. especially when he masters the use of chaff and focusing his cavalry together. well i'm not sure how i will deal with it.

Also that brutal rule for all Salamanders on this mission punished me so much! we picked the mission randomly as well so i cant even complain that much about it.

From Bag of Bones Gaming thanks for watching/reading!