Got my first 8th Ed game (and my 4th Warhammer game, btw), this morning. It was a 2500 pts battle against High Elves. We didn´t knew which army we would face. My opponent was quite a rookie too, hadn´t played much Warhammer before, so It was a good learning game and we went slowly checking rules and stuff, so only managed 3 full game turns. Still, it was enough for the Dawi to massacre some Elgi butt!

It was my first chance to test my ideas on “BSB and bodyguards on second line” army, which you can read about here: http://www.bugmansbrewery.com/topic/29262-bsb-in-8th-edition/

Also, this is my first battlereport on the Brewery.

My opponent had less knowledge of the new rules than I did, and he still had a lot of 7th edition “baggage” in his gameplay.
We both learned a lot, but he did it the hard way 😉

Dwarf Army

• Dwarf Lord – General. Shieldbearers, Shield, Runes of Furnace, Stone, Preservation, Resistance, Fire, Might, Cleaving. @ 268 pts.
• Dwarf Thane – Battle Standard Bearer. BS, Rune of Valaya, Strollaz, Guardian @275 pts
• Runesmith - Shield, Runes of Stone, Balance @127 pts
• Master Engineer- Brace of Pistols, Rune of Stone, Fire.@90 pts.
• Dwarf Warriors x 25 – Full Command, Shields, Great Weapons. @300 pts
• Dwarf Longbeards x 20 - Full Command, Shields, Great Weapons, Rune of Battle. @330 pts.
• Dwarf Longbeards x 13 - Full Command, Shields, Master Rune of Grungni. @ 231 pts.
• Thunderers x 10 – Musician, Shields. @155 pts.
• Thunderers x 10 – Musician, Shields. @155 pts.
• Hammerers x 18 – Shields, Full Command, Rune of Determination.@ 284 pts.
• Grudgethrower – Runes of Accuracy, Penetration, Fire. @135 pts.
• Cannon - Engineer, Brace of Pistols, Runes of Fire, Forging. @ 150 pts.

Detailed explanation of why some of the choices can be found here: http://www.bugmansbrewery.com/topic/29305-2500-pts-vs-all-armies/

High Elf Army

• Lv 4 Mage, with Life Magic, Staff of Solidity, dispel scroll. Spells: Earth Blood, Shield of Thorns, Regrowth, Dwellers Bellow. Deployed in his Sea Guard Horde.
• 10 Silver Helms, with Elven Heroe with Talisman of Loec and Star Lance
• 15 archers
• 40 Lothern Sea Guard Full, Command, something that made immune to Flaming and Banner of Sorcery.
• 15 White Lions, Full Command, with Elven Hero (no idea of its equipment)
• 15 Phoenix Guard (no FC I think)
• 10 Dragon Princes, Full Command
• 2 Bolt Throwers

We rolled Scenario #3, Battle for the Pass. We were playing at a GW Store, in a 2x2 realms of battle modular board, with a hill in 2 corners. Much of the shop´s scenery hadn´t returned from the Spanish Gamesday, so we only had another small hill, a Watchtower and a small forest to use. In keeping with 8th Ed Spirit, we placed them all, the small hill in one of the free corners, the watchtower near the other one and the forest in the middle of the board. It gave a nice “mountain pass” feel to the board.

I got to choose sides, and opted for the “hill and tower” end, so the Elves took the double hills. As we deployed our troops, we opted to roll to see if we had any sort of special hill. Turned out that the Elven hills were 2 “Anvil of Vaul” and my hill was a Scree Slope. With that, the board really came to life: the scree slope and the watchtower were dwarven defenses of a road to their hold. On the other hand, the Elven Archmage had invoked his god Vaul to “awaken” the hills to help their army. The forest in the middle of the board turned up to a normal forest (boring!).

Deployment:

My battleline, from left to right, had a unit of thunderers, the entrenched GT and the cannon in the Scree Slope, with the ME nearby trying not to draw too much attention. In the middle of my deployment zone, from left to right, I placed the Warriors, big unit of Longbeards and the Hammerers with Lord, with the watchtower anchoring that flank. The small unit of Longbeards with the BSB and Runesmith directly behind the first Longbeard unit. Finally, my other Thunderer unit deployed in the Watchtower.

The Elves deployed, from my point of view, left to right: on the hill the Silver Helms with Hero, Archers and 1 Boltthrower. In the middle of his deployment he placed the Sea Guard in horde formation, White Lions, Phoenix Guard and Dragon Princes, almost at the base on the other hill, where he placed the other BT.

I won the initiative, and chose to go first, hoping to do some early Wizard snipping 😉

Deployment looked like this:

Dwarfs Turn 1

Movement: Infantry stays put, with the watchtower and Thunderers protecting their right flank, and WM´s and Thunderers the left flank.

Shooting: With both my WM´s with Rune of Fire, the Dragon Princes we excluded as a target. Grudgethrower aims at the Wizard´s head, but scatters far away. Cannon shoots at Elven Hero with Silver Helms, which makes his LO,S!. Only kills a single Knight.

Elves Turn 1

Movement: Advances troops, marching in full, Dragon Princes come dangerously close of the Hammerers, Phoenix Guard march behind them, White Lions get inside the (dice roll: normal) Forest, Sea Guard move onto the left side of the forest
Magic: after various modifiers, phase ends up with 11 PD and 6 DD. The Wizard casts Regeneration at Sea Guard (I let the spell pass), Resurrects the fallen Silver Helm (fail to dispel it by 1 or 2 points), casts Shield of Thorns in Dragon Princes, which I also opt not to dispel, counting on Valaya 😉

Shooting: Archers shoot at Thunderers on the hill, 1 hit, saved by armor. Sea Guard makes 19 shoots at Thunderers in hill, 2 casualties. BT shoot multiple arrows at Thunderers, 1 casualty.

Thunderers brace themselves behind their shield (MRo Grungni was too far away to help them. Having endured over 25 shots, with 4 casualties, they pass their panic check and stay put. God, I love playing Dwarfs! :dance3:

The BT on the other side of the board shoot multiple arrows at Hammerers, causing 1 casualty.

Battle at the end of turn 1:

Dwarfs Turn 2

Movement: Seeing how the arrogant Dragon Princes had advanced without any support, the Dwarf Lord orders a charge! Hammerers charge 7 inches into the Dragon Princes (with boxcars in the charge dice, really motivated they were)! The Elf player grabs his head…

Longbeards advance to keep the battleline, the BSB Bodyguard come into 12” range of the Dragon Princes, so in my magic phase Valaya dispels their RIP spell.

Warriors wheel to face both Silver Helms and Seaguard, making sure they have a chance to aid the Thunderers if needed, and sealing the left flank.

Shooting: Thunderers in the hill fire at Silver Helms and the ones in the Watchtower shoot at the Phoenix Guard, no casualties though.

Cannon shoots at the White Lions, killing 4, Hero makes his LO,S! save.

Grudgethrower aims towards the Wizard stupid head ornament, but scatters harmlessly, even with both rerolls. I give its crew and the ME a very angry grin… :treaten:

Close Combat:

Dwarf Lord Challenges and slaughters the Champion, causing 3 wounds (with his normal, handweapon, since his awesome runic axe had flaming attacks). Combat ends with about 4 hammerers dead and 2 other Princes slain. I Win combat by 5, Princes fail break test, the Flee!, they run 10 inches. Nearby Phoenix Guard fail their Panic test and join them, running 9 inches like the sissies elves they are (not sure how to spell that…)

Hammerers reform to face both the Dragon Princes and the White Lions, increasing frontage to 7 (something I should started the battle with…)

Elves Turn 2

Movement:

Dragon Princes rally, Phoenix Guard keep running, now almost at the table edge. The Elf player is quite dubitative… The White Lions retreat (moves backwards) 3 inches out of the woods and to the side of the Sea Guards (chicken!!! hehehe).

Silver Helms charge the Thunderers on the hill. Three die to the treacherous scree slope and another one for the Thunderers Stand and Shoot. He is perfectly positioned to overrun into my entrenched GT…

Magic Winds end up with 10 pd and 5 DD.

Wizards casts resurrection spell with 6 dices, achieving IF, curing 3 Silver Helms, spends his “ignore first miscast” item. Casts Regeneration at the Sea Guard, I fail to dispel with lots of 1 rolls.

Sea Guard, without having moved, unleashed over 25 arrows upon the warriors, only to kill one of them. Shields and Master Rune of Grungni shined here. Archers shoot at the warriors too, managing to kill 2.

2 BT shoot multiple shots at the Hammerers, killing 2. Again, Shields and MRo Grungni come to the rescue.

Close combat:

The Silver Helms slaughter all the Thunderers, except the musician, who fails to kill any elf. Enraged at this, the lone Thunderers rolls snake eyes for his break test!!!!!, and with some very rude gestures at the astonished knights, keeps fighting! Silver Helms can forget about overrunning, as they stay pinned by the MVP of the game: the brave Thunderer´s musician.

This epic moment of Dwarveness deserved a picture:

At the end of turn 2, the battle looked like this:

Dwarfs Turn 3

Movement
Warriors charge the exactly 9 inches needed in aid of the brave lonely thunderer, losing 1 warrior to the treacherous scree slope (a taste of our own medicine I suppose). They crash into the Silver Helm´s flank, seeking bloody retribution!

Longbeards don´t want to risk fighting in the woods and be outmaneuvered, risking the control of the middle of the board. So wait facing the Sea Guard and White Lions.

The Dwarf Lord glimpses a second golden opportunity: the Dragon Princes are 10 inches away… Wanting to “keep the initiative”, he and his Hammerers charge the Dragon Princes, AGAIN! :dwarf: Another epic moment that deserved a picture:

Shooting:

Thunderers in tower shoot at the White Lions, killing 1.

Cannon hits the Sea Guard, but they have Flaming immunity by some implement, so lost shot.

GT misfires, even with rerolls, skips next turn too. By now I´m seriously furious at what I had expected to be the best warmachine ever. Had all the crew and ME take the Slayer oath after the battle. :diablo: Hope that the next crew will perform better.

Close Combat:

Silver Helms finally dispatch the brave Thunderer and a single Warrior to the Flank. The Heroe activates the Amulet Loec, but really didn´t helped him much. The Warriors cut down 2 Silver Helms, which fail their break test and crash into the mountain side at the table edge. Warriors reform to face the Seaguard, calculating a future joint charge with the Longbeards…

The Dragon Princes cut down 4 Hammerers, but they kill 2 of them and with the build up momentum, break them. Not wanting to “loose the initiative”, the Hammerers pursue. Elves get 7” flee, and dwarfs 8” pursue, cutting them to pieces! :yahoo:

Elves turn 3.

Movement
The Phoenix Guards, who seemed that couldn´t be bothered with the battle at all, exits the table, without losing a single trooper, nor swinging their weapons a single time.

Magic Winds end up with 7 PD and 6 DD.

With the shop almost closing and with a desperate attempt to reverse the tide of the battle, Wizard casts Dweller´s Bellow with 6 dice, causing IF. 11 Dwarf Warriors killed – OOUCH!!! :wizard: , but pass their Panic check (did I mentioned I love playing Dwarfs?).

Epic magic havoc ensues: Wizard rolls snakeeyes in his miscast table, killing 19 seaguard and plunging himself into the Chaos Void. The Sea Guard panics and the nearby White Lions panic as well, all running towards their deployment zone.

Shooting:

BT 1 multiple shots at the Hammerers, without Grungni nearby, killing 3. BT 2 shoots single bolt, fails to hit.

Archers fail to kill anyone.

Battle at the end of turn 3 (lots of Elven casualties in the picture, though not in the game... White Lions where fleeing though the picture don´t show it).

End of game, store closing, the Elf player conceded. We counted both SeaGuard and White Lions as destroyed units on agreement, but wouldn´t have made much difference.

Dwarfs only lost the Thunderers, 150 pts. Suffered heavy casualties in warriors and Hammerers, Longbeards units almost untouched.

Elves lost 1800 pts!!!! That includes General, standards and the 2 fleeing units. Only archers and the 2 BT surviving.

With a grinning smile, the Dwarf Lord claimed victory. The mountain pass was defended with minimal loses. Signaling to let loose the beer barrels, he went to talk to the GT crew and ME about their future slayer oath.

Afterthoughts.

I need to start painting my army. :blush:

I was much more in tune with 8th Edition than my opponent. He was especially shocked at my charges and reforms. While I think luck smiled me more than not (except with WMs and shooting), I think I managed to get the most of my army list.

I wished we could have had a big infantry bloodbath in the middle of the board. It certainly seemed all that infantry would crash headlong. Maybe another time.

While the BSB itself was useless, both Valaya and Grungni played well. I didn´t felt I needed to use Strollaz in this battle.

Most magic phases where quite heavy, as he was able to get many extra power dices. With his “immune to first miscast” he was using tons of dice for each spell. Fortunately, only at the last minute a really nasty spelled triggered, with it´s
appropriate miscast.

Equipment: both shields against shooting and GW´s in cutting those heavy armored knights payed themselves in full.

I wish I could pump up my thunderers to 15 strong, at least one of them, but at this moment, there is nothing in my current list I would change. I will give the GT another opportunity, though I certainly wished I had an organ gun.

Hope you enjoyed it. I welcome your comments.