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!