My clubmate Drew is feverishly working on loads of terrain for our Dead of Winter GT in January, but he’s also playing in it and figured he should probably see if he still remembers of Kings works. I’m always down to smash so had him over one recent Sunday afternoon.

FREE DWARFS
Earth Elementals Horde – Brew of Sharpness
Earth Elementals Horde
Earth Elementals Horde
Mastiff Hunting Pack Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
Mastiff Hunting Pack Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
Mastiff Hunting Pack Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
Greater Earth Elemental – Craggoth & Kholearm
Greater Earth Elemental
Greater Earth Elemental
Dwarf Lord on Large Beast – Blade of the Beast Slayer
Dwarf Lord on Large Beast – Orb of Towering Presence
Free Dwarf Stone Priest – Conjurer’s Staff, Surge (8), Bane Chant (2)
2150 (12/21)

Yea baby, Craggoth is back! I realized I could get my large resin son on the table at 2150, so even if the Stoneclaws are god tier units I couldn’t resist the temptation. Taking so many triples at an event that only allows triples seems kinda spammy but big ol’ shrug there. Also I took throwing mastiffs again because it was that or bloat up the Stone Priest, which I was still hesitant to do.

UNDEAD
Wights Horde – Brew of Sharpness
Wights Horde – Brew of Haste
Wights Horde – Boots of Striding
Soul Reaver Infantry Regiment – Chalice of Wrath
Zombies Regiment
Zombies Regiment
Zombies Regiment
Wraiths Troop
Wraiths Troop
Vampire Lord on Undead Pegasus – Surge (4)
Vampire Lord on Undead Pegasus
Necromancer – Inspiring Talisman; Surge (6), Bane Chant (2)
Necromancer – Surge (6), Weakness (2)
2150 (13/22)

Drew hasn’t played his Undead in 18 months and as far as I can tell this is basically the same list as back then. Triple Wights make me endlessly salty (spamming mediocre things is cool, spamming amazing things is boring), but when I spend any time thinking about their drawbacks (i.e. very high points and irregular) I grudgingly can see that they aren’t broken. And Sp 7 puts them on the back foot when it comes to alpha-ing things … except when you’re fighting a Sp 4-6 army 🙃 There are things I’d do differently in this list (trash all the items to upgrade the Zombies to Skeletons or turn the third Zombies into something that does something) but Drew can’t paint anything new so is kind of stuck. And he refuses to play his beautiful Gnollgres any more into the modern meta, because “Ogres suck” 😛 Regardless, this list has 4 units capable of really mangling my metal children, plus the Vampasus nonsense.

We tried out Stockpile this game, one of the new missions from Clash ’24. It’s like Loot but each of the three Loot markers can generate 2-3 tokens each (3 for the center, 2 for the other two). After they’ve been ‘dug up’ or whatever they work the same as normal Loot tokens, as far as carrying them around, etc. goes. Drew won first turn and took it.

BATTLE

Turn 0: Undead deployment worth noting = the surge Vampasus is on the left, the inspiring bane chant Necromancer is in the center swamp, and the Wights are (left to right) Sp 8, strider, and sharpness. My sharp Earth Elementals are in the center. Craggoth scouts forward directly into the right Vampasus’ face, generally making his life difficult.

Turn 1: The Undead creep forward! After some debate, the right Vampasus abandons the flank, not able to hop past Craggoth. But a Necromander weakens the big robot scorpion for good measure.

The Freeforged stumble forward in response! All three Mastiff Packs scamper up and dig tokens out of the Stockpile markers. I’m essentially doing the dirty work, assuming Drew will smash the dogs and take my tokens, but I’d rather we were fighting over something so may as put some tokens into play.

Undead 2: Drew refuses to commit any hammers 😐 Instead it’s a chaff off, with two regiments of Zombies swarming off the hill into Mastiffs on the left (3 damage) and bane chanted Zombies and Wraiths dismembering the pack in the center. Those Zombie units pull more tokens out of the Stockpiles while they’re at it. Also Craggoth is weakened a second time.

Free Dwarfs 2: While they aren’t the trades I want, I figure I might as well go hard and see just how much the premier Undead hammers can lift. Starting on the left, the orb Beast Lord grounds the fast Wights (4 damage), while the Earth Elemental horde on that flank joins up with the Mastiffs to do 6 damage to some Zombies (…). In the center, the sharp Earth Elementals charge off a hill into the 2 token Zombies, doing 15 damage from 18 attaks and obliterating them. They dig up a token in the process, going to 3 tokens and pretty much guaranteed to die next turn. They face the Soul Reavers so at least the strider Wights have to use a surge to flank them. Unfortunately, the Greater Earth and Earth horde (bane chanted!) to their right only manage 8 damage into a troop of Wraiths, then snake eyes the roll. So I don’t even have a reprisal when the sharp rocks die. Boo.

Over on the right, the surviving Mastiffs dig up a second token, step into the woods and unleash bees at the weakness Necromancer! Decent damage is dealt through the magic of throwing mastiffs receiving no negatives to hit. Craggoth skitters forward and hits the decrepit heretic with fireball 10, which adds a couple more damage (and shattering) despite being weakened. The Necro incinerates, which is Very Cool.

Finally, I hold the other Greater Earth on the left/center back, 12.5″ away from the Soul Reavers but unfortunately within range of the other Wraith troop. I legit forgot that they charge 14″ and thought I was being cagey 😦

Undead 3: So naturally those Wraiths charge the GEE to block him up. They do no damage but bleh. In other news, the Wights on the left chunk 6 damage into the Orb Lord, wavering him, while the Zombies on that flank mob the Earth horde (0 damage) and the Mastiffs (up to 5 damage). The sharpness Earth Elementals are indeed front charged by Soul Reavers and surge-flanked by the strider Wights. Despite being De 6, my dudes are absolutely wrecked, with their 3 tokens going to the Soul Reavers because Wights lose a lot by picking up a token (-2 Sp, no fly, no surge). Also the Wraiths in the center do a sterling 2 damage to their Greater Earth Elemental.

On the right, the sharpness Wights (hinder) charge Craggoth and do 7 damage, and the non-surge Vampasus (hinder) charges the 2 token Mastiffs in the woods and does nothing. I’ll take it.

Free Dwarfs 3: I am feeling distinctly behind at this point, with all the counters I setup to retake the middle stuck on stupid Wraiths. To wit, both Greaters counter-charge their Wraith troops and slaughter them (the Earth horde in the center helps out in a flank because they have nothing else to do). The Orb Lord fails his headstrong, freeing the fast Wights to do whatever they want (!!), but at least the Earth horde on the left flank routs some Zombies, taking their token. The Mastiffs over there chomp 3 damage into the other Zombies.

On the right, the Blade Lord flank charges (hindered) the sharpness Wights after the 2 token Mastiffs back 3.5″ away from the Vampasus in the woods. The Blade Lord and Craggoth smash 8 damage into the Wights but can’t nab the rout (Math-centric readers will note I should have done 10-11 damage, which is pretty gnarly with brutal tacked on, but my damage dice have been anemic this game.)

Undead 4: The Blade Lord is flanked by a (hindered) Vampasus and countered by the sharpness Wights, and is reduced to slag. Rip that guy. The Mastiffs on the left are also torn apart by Zombies, who scoop up their token, and the fresh Earth Elemental horde in the center, a De 6 -/18 unit, is one rounded by the strider Wights. What the living hell, Drew! But it’s not all bad news as the fast Wights don’t even waver the Orb Lord on 12 damage, and the Greater Earth charged by Soul Reavers holds firm on 9 damage, which is the first time Drew has rolled a statistically average round of damage.

Also the surge Vampasus on the left flies over and blocks the other Greater Earth from flanking the Soul Reavers and saving his buddy.

Free Dwarfs 4: I feel like I need a miracle to combat Drew’s insane damage dice at this point, but you what, I’ll take hot rout dice instead. The last of the Earth Elemental hordes (!) charges the fast Wights alongside the Orb Lord, putting the super ghosts to bed. Shortly after this, the Greater Earth in the lower left obliges the Vampasus and charges in, but I slam a double 10+ rout through and one round her! The other Greater Earth doesn’t work the same magic (5 damage on the Soul Reavers) but bane chanted (hindered) Mastiffs in the flank and Craggoth in the front does see the terror of the sharpness Wights ended as well. Two Wight hordes and one Vampasus is a heavy hit but Drew has two healthy hammers and two objective holders left to work with.

Undead 5: The Zombies (1 token) scramble 10″ into the flank of the triumphant Greater Earth, who takes 2 damage and cannot be bothered. The Soul Reavers (3 tokens) finish off the other Great Earth and prepare to receive his brother’s wrath, and the surviving Wights (their strider boots popped so they’re “just” a horde of Wights now) easily remove the last of my Mastiffs, scooping up their 2 tokens. The Vampasus once more spends a turn getting out of Craggoth’s LOS.

Free Dwarfs 5: The Orb Lord thunders into the rear of the Zombies, decimating them and taking their 1 token. The Greater Earth Elemental finally charges the 3 damage Soul Reavers, and routs them with the authority born of vengeance. He scoops up their 3 tokens (also the Stone Priest rear charged them to help but couldn’t wound). And Craggoth crashes into the last of the Wights, dealing 5 damage before he goes down.

Undead 6: With a Vampasus in the flank and Wights in the front, Craggoth succumbs to his wounds.

Free Dwarfs 6: I think for a while about just consolidating my position and winning 4-3, but realize that my Greater can’t escape the Wight’s 14″ charge, so may as well play for it. The Greater Earth drops his 3 tokens, ripping off into the Wights and dunking them too. He claims their 2 tokens, while the Orb Lord marches up and adds the GEE’s previous 3 to his 1.

Turn 7: Of course there’s another turn. Unable to see the Orb Lord, the Vampasus can either hinder charge a 2 damage Greater Earth Elemental or GTFO. He chooses discretion this time around, and the inspiring Necromancer flees for the hills as well.

I send my Greater powering after the Necromancer, forget that you can’t surge if you have tokens, but fall 1″ short of adding another kill marking to this Greater’s hull. Regardless, that’s 7-0 so a commanding …

FREEFORGED VICTORY

What a wild smashfest, and a real killing spree for that Greater Earth Elemental! He killed something like 800 points once he was allowed to move, single-handedly (cause he’s only got one 🙃) winning the game for me. Madness. It was certainly frustrating early on when Drew’s dice were hot fire, so my De 6 meant nothing, and my damage output was so bad that I had to trade down more than I already do. Happily we had all those rout spikes in Turn 4 and dug back out.

As for the list, I did decide to drop the throwing mastiffs and invest in the Priest a bit after this. I’m thinking of giving Wither & Perish (3) a try, still doesn’t give him anything to do on the way in, but does help me grind by making my dude’s effectively De 7 plus pushing some damage through against weak targets with a lot of nerve.

Until next time, happy holidays!

One of my favorite things to do on Thanksgiving is game, which can be hit or miss depending on how much travel is involved. This year I wasn’t traveling, so a quick text to my buddy Jeff confirmed that I would be gaming! With some time to kill before he and his vamps arrived, I busied myself with a little hobbying in the kitchen that would be ready to deploy after the carnage …

FREE DWARFS
Earth Elementals Horde – Brew of Sharpness
Earth Elementals Horde
Earth Elementals Horde
Stoneclaw Riders Regiment – Grenades
Stoneclaw Riders Regiment – Grenades
Mastiff Hunting Pack Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
Mastiff Hunting Pack Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
Greater Earth Elemental
Greater Earth Elemental
Dwarf Lord on Large Beast – Blade of the Beast Slayer
Dwarf Lord on Large Beast – Orb of Towering Presence
Free Dwarf Stone Priest – Stoneshapers; Surge (8), Martyr’s Prayer (7), Bane Chant (2)
2150 (12/22)

I alluded to wanting to take martyr’s prayer in the last report, so figured I should give it a shot. With the extra points I gave the Stone Priest the stoneshaper ability I discovered he didn’t come with any more (😬) and loaded the remaining Mastiffs up with bees. This would be my first time using throwing mastiffs, although I have certainly been on the receiving end.

UNDEAD
Soul Reaver Cavalry Regiment – Boots of Striding
Soul Reaver Cavalry Regiment
Soul Reaver Infantry Regiment – Chalice of Wrath
Soul Reaver Infantry Regiment – Staying Stone
Mummies Regiment
Mummies Regiment
Wraiths Troop
Wraiths Troop
Vampire Lord on Undead Horse – Pipes of Terror, Knowledgeable; Host Shadowbeast (3)
Lykanis – Orb of Towering Presence
Necromancer – Inspiring Talisman; Surge (6), Weakness (2)
Necromancer – Weakness (2)
Necromancer – Weakness (2)
2150 (13/22)

Jeff is pretty sick of running his Undead at this point and theoretically working on Elves now, which will be loaded with shooting and Drakons, neither of which his Undead have. But what they do have is weakness! I’d prefer the inspiring Necro had bane chant instead (and the third Necro was anything else) but eh, Jeff is hot for budget weakness casters so I mentally prepared to grind even harder. Martyr’s prayer, don’t fail me now!

We rolled up Fool’s Gold and I’m pretty sure it’s the first time either of us had played it 😅 I kind of prefer it to Smoke & Mirrors as there’s less mental load, but really whatever, it’s my first time playing a Pillage variant with this army so would be good practice for the ‘Forged. Jeff won the roll and had me go first, I think mostly out of indecision.

BATTLE

Turn 0: Battlelines! My Stoneclaws are still blank bases with drones on them, sorry readers. Also the inspiring Necromancer is the Warhammer Necro in a black cloak in the very center of the Undead lines.

Turn 1: The Freeforged struggle forward, with the Stoneclaws playing it cagey on the flanks. The only charge I give Jeff is his Vampire Lord into my blade Beast Lord …

… which Jeff takes 🫠 He hosts up and does a brutal 8 damage to my Beast Lord, who wavers but holds. Yowza was that closer than it needed to be. The rest of the Undead advance in a line, but Jeff does do some canny hiding of his Lykanis to protect him from Stoneclaws. Necros toss weakness onto both the Earth Elemental horde and Greater Earth Elemental that could mess with his Vampire Lord next turn.

Turn 2: Weakness or not, I send that Earth horde into the Vampire Lord, with the Blade Lord in the front when he passes headstrong. Bane chant fails on the horde but I roll like a maniac and drop the Undead blender hero in one go, reforming to face the incoming Mummies. The rest of the turn is spent holding vampires in place to buy me time to advance: the Orb Lord disorders the strider Soul Reaver Cav (4 damage), Mastiffs leap off the hill into the other Soul Reaver Cav (1 damage), and the other Mastiffs scamper into the right Soul Reaver Infantry (0 damage but they didn’t have any TC to strip anyway). Stoneclaws on the left back away from the Lykanis while the ones on the right threaten a dive into the Undead lines (and toss a grenade at the right Wraiths to no effect).

To get the murder out of the way, Jeff kills both Mastiff packs and backs his vamps up. The strider Soul Reaver Cav carve 5 damage into the Orb Lord, whose flank is officially being threatened by Soul Reaver Infantry as well, and the Mummies (hindered) charge the Earth horde that saw their master off but only do 2 damage. Wraiths nicely block the flank of the Mummies from the right Stoneclaws, while the Wraiths and Lykanis on the left play escort for their own Mummies’ advance. Finally, weakness is liberally applied to the Orb Lord and the right Greater Earth on the hill.

Free Dwarfs 3: Strap in, it’s going to be a violent if not decisive turn as we begin the grind. From left to right, a Stoneclaws regiment and the sharp Earth horde charge and shatter a Mummy regiment. The Orb Lord (now CS0) really doesn’t want to be flanked by the Soul Reaver Infantry in the woods, so withdraws 1″ from the Soul Reaver Cav, turns 90, walks towards the SRI and rotates to face … moments before a Greater Earth Elemental plows into the cav (~5 damage total). The other Soul Reaver Cav receive an Earth horde to the face (off the central hill) (7 damage total), and the Soul Reaver Infantry to the right are charged by the weakened Greater Earth (who may or may not have been on the hill) (6 damage total). The right Mummies are combo-charged by an Earth horde and the Blade Lord (5 damage), and finally, the Stoneclaws fly over the Wraiths and charge the weakness Necro lurking behind them (5 damage). Frustratingly they fail to pop the old sack of bones.

Worth noting that bane chant on the Earth Elementals fighting the Soul Reaver Cavalry failed (0 for 2).

Undead 3: Damage is poured across the battlefield as the vampires sink their fangs into the sweet, irony hides of the Freeforged. Jeff starts things off by rolling for the Soul Reaver Infantry (hindered) into the Orb Lord on 5 damage, as he’s inspiring all of my left flank. They do a wild 8 damage, bringing him to 13, before snaking the roll! Catastrophe! I am compelled to note that probability puts that at 5 damage and a rerolled 7 to rout, but Jeff cares not for maths.

Recovering from disaster, Jeff still has a lot of dice to roll. The Wraiths on the left pick things up by illegally flank charging the sharp Earth horde, who they couldn’t actually see past the H4 Stoneclaws but big shrug (1 damage). The Stoneclaws themselves are disordered by the Lykanis (2 damage), and the Greater Earth Elemental takes 4 damage from the disordered strider Soul Reaver Cav. The central Earth horde takes 5 damage from the other disordered SRC, and the SRI to the right shred 6 into their GEE – note the Wraiths who have stalled out 0.5″ from the big guy’s flank, Jeff being unable to roll the 2″ surge required. On the right, the Mummies hammer the Blade Lord to 9 damage but he holds.

Finally, weakness goes up on the sharp Earth horde preparing to blend the flank of the Orb Lord’s reavers. Note as well that all those vamp units have lifeleeched 2 damage and the Mummies on the right have gone from 5 damage to 0. Nice.

Free Dwarfs 4: All the bluff tokens turn over at the end of Turn 3, as seen in the first shot here. Jeff put one of his 1 pointers hard right amidst all that impassable terrain, and his other ones in my deployment zone. Not a bad idea – his Wraiths often jump the enemy line and can play for deep objectives, plus my dudes are slow and go in one direction while he can march and is overall quite fast. Obviously I’m content to grind for 4 points down the middle of the board.

Even with all the healing last turn, I aim to put some vamps into the dirt and start heading for points. We pay Jeff’s snake eyes back by flanking those Soul Reavers with the sharp Earth horde, whose weakness is countered by my bane chant (1 of 3 at last) and the Orb Lord in the front. They die the true death. The central Soul Reaver Cavalry are likewise turned to ashes by a regular Earth horde going to work, and the Soul Reaver Infantry next to them are buried by Stoneclaws in the flank and the Greater Elemental in their front. RIP to all those suckers.

In other news, the Lykanis is booped for 2 damage by disordered Stoneclaws, the last of the Soul Reaver Cavalry are wavered by their Greater Elemental on 9 damage, and the Mummies are driven back up to 9 damage by a particularly spirited Earth horde and Blade Lord combo.

Undead 4: With the execution of his vampires, Jeff is wildly spiraling away from this game but we persevere. Wraiths sandwich the central Earth Elementals, spooping them up to 12 damage but no rout. The Mummies on the right do kill the blade Beast Lord at long last, reforming to face the right Earth horde, and dropping to 4 damage in the process. And the Lykanis on the left jumps up and dunks his Stoneclaws up to 5 damage.

Triple weakness is tossed around again this turn, but only weakens the right Earth Elementals, failing to cast elsewhere twice.

Free Dwarfs 5: Heat blades rise and fall as the Freeforged end more of the Undead menace. From left to right, the sharp Earth Elementals EZ charge into the flank of the Lykanis fighting the Stoneclaws, routing the pup with ease. The Orb Lord lines up to race for a bottom token next turn (I don’t understand why he didn’t reform last turn to do something useful? Like kill the weakness Necro right next to him?), shortly before the Greater Elemental next to him ends the Soul Reaver Cavalry it’s fought turn after turn. The Earth Elementals trapped in the Wraith sandwich attempt to escape but only deal 3 damage to one of the Wraiths, while the Stoneclaws that could have rear charged the other troop of ghosts instead try to kill the inspiring Necromancer and overrun into them. They deal 2 damage and get stuck on the loathsome heretic (yes yes I got greedy here). However, some overruns work better than others as a Greater Earth Elemental crashes into and through a weakness Necro and into the flank of the Mummies, shattering them with the help of the weakened Earth horde to their front.

Bane chant, by the by, was attempted on the sandwiched Earth Elementals but failed (1 of 4).

Undead 5: The Wraiths tear the beleaguered Earth Elementals apart and face their large metal enemies. The inspiring Necro (disordered) attempts to ground some Stoneclaws but no dice, and the surviving weakness Necro also fails in whatever it was doing.

Free Dwarfs 6: The sharp Earth Elemental horde charges the last weakness Necro, crumbling it and claiming a point, as Greater Earth Elementals thunder into the Wraiths. The wounded troop expires while the other takes 3 damage. And I claim 3 other points, bringing me to 5 total, largely thanks to Stoneclaws.

Also I cast martyr’s prayer for the first time this edition, healing 2 damage from the Greater Elemental engaged with the Wraiths. Hell yea.

Undead 6: The Necromancer has a go at my Stone Priest, and while he lands the hit my caster is too tough to wound 😤 The Wraiths scrabble my Greater back to 6 damage.

Free Dwarfs 7: Of course there’s more 🤦‍♂️ The Wraiths are hit with 36 CS3 attaks and disappear, and Stoneclaws swoop down on the inspiring Necromancer and silence his babbling at last. And I cast martyr’s prayer, healing a Greater down to 2 damage because I can. Since I claim all but 1 point, this is a commanding …

FREEFORGED VICTORY

Poor Jeff, that’s two tablings in a row versus me, playing wildly different armies. It was instructive to see that I can grind one-to-one versus the most serious blenders in the game, which sort of became the game plan back in Turn 3 or whatever, even tho Jeff’s dice combined with LL2 meant that was a pretty high risk way to play it. He’s played his Undead for a long time and could really do with a new army that would let him learn new tactics and generally be more invested again.

As far as my testing goes, I never used my throwing mastiffs and I suspect I rarely will. When I mobilize my chaff it’s almost always to go get in the way, which necessitates running forward more than 6″ and not surviving, both of which are bad for getting a shooting attak off. Martyr’s prayer certainly existed? I suspect it’s only really going to be used in Turns 1-2 as I close with a shooting opponent. I can think of several games at Crossroads where it would have been great (i.e. the ones where I was getting shot) but it doesn’t come into play much ironically when the grind begins, where I would much rather be bane chanting to come out on top faster rather than pulling a few damage off to extend the grind. IMO people mostly take highly effective damage dealers when it comes to melee, not plink damage, and while the high end of MP is grand (7 damage! Imagine!), I don’t think the 3-4 you usually get is going to matter. Maybe only on De 6+ units? Clearly I am torn, but would rather have the third Mastiffs so adios for now.

The Stoneclaws continue to be great. While they frustrated me by failing to pick up Necromancers on demand, it was nice to have the option to reach over and slap a caster / look for overruns, which isn’t something I’ve had much of. The birds are also gods on Pillage scenarios, which I could have told you having faced Scorchies and their ilk before. I’ll admit to not liking them a bit for how easy they are to play 🙃

UP NEXT: Some kind of Herd wrap up to cap 2023!