Kings of War 2nd Ed - Battle is Joined

Hurrah! a battle report!

Hurrah, Kings of War 2.0 arrived!  In a rare stroke of good fortune I was the first amongst my gaming buddies to receive his Kickstarter package of the rules; two shiny rulebooks, counters, wound markers (not great in my opinion but you can't have everything, eh?) and a wee metal minstrel.  Another figure followed later.  This seemed like a good opportunity, having got my miniature collection into some order again, to arrange a battle.

Ross' Ogres would be the opponent, and we agreed to 2,500 points.  It was just small enough for me to field my Orcs and Goblins rather than the Dogs of War.

This I was able to do by fielding a lot of Orc Morax, armed with dual weapons chucking out a fistful of attacks, and two giants.  Simon and Nigel.

For Ross' part, he also fielded a giant along with hordes of Ogres armed with clubs and cannon.  We had the classic Kill and Pillage scenario, and lined up across pretty even handed terrain where the position of the pillage markers slightly favoured me.

From the Ogre lines

Legions of Ogres in Ross' centre

Orcs bolster the lines of allied goblins I needed

The Orcs advanced cautiously, looking to create traps and kill zones for the advancing Ogres.  They naturally used their pace to close range quickly, Ross looking to get his shotgun-esque missle troops in range quickly.

    

Rumble!

 Ross took the bait on my left, hitting my Orc Ax horde (40 chaps with shields) with a legion of Ogres.  As hoped we weathered the storm, and three units smashed into the Ogres on the counter-attack; resulting in 36 wounds on the unit, which swiftly dispersed.  This left a huge gap in Ross' line.  But he wasn't yet worried.  I had problems of my own...

There's a bit of a gap on my flank

 A regiment of fleabag riders covering my flank had bolted at the first strike of a troop of wolves, leaving my flank wide open.  I was going to need to redeploy to face a threat that could wreak havoc with my defence.  Forward Simon and my Krudger general in a chariot, in an attempt to delay the enemy from exploiting my problems.

Disorder, disorder

 Not everything by this point was going to plan, when you're relying on Goblins to face down Ogres you know you're on the ropes.  Although things were going ok on my left, I'd lost my own horde and some of my other key troops and it was getting difficult to contain the Ogres.  Simon and the Krudger had fallen to countless blows, whilst Nigel was far to the left; away from potential new foes.

Possession is 9/10ths of the law

Moreover the Ogres sat on three of the five objectives, whilst I could at best lay claim to only one.  Although the losses under the Kill part of the scenario were roughly even, possibly slightly in my favour by the end of six turns, the values of the objectives placed the victory clearly in Ross' hands,

A tight game, that I could have won with a bit of luck.

This isn't intended to be a full review of Kings of War 2nd ed. that may follow as I am aware after Age of Sigmar there are many people interested in the rules.  But it is safe to say they are streamlined without losing any of the elements that made the original game great, it is still easy to learn, fast to play, challenging and fun.

I look forward to more.