Dawn of the Second Day. I’m hungover, on the bottom table, playing an exceedingly nice dude whose brother had roped him into playing a tournament for a game he didn’t have a ton of experience with but was down to throw some dice. But also here’s his list:

GAME 4: DWARFS

Shieldbreakers Horde – Chant of Hate, Throwing Mastiff
Shieldbreakers Horde – Boots of Striding, Throwing Mastiff
Ironguard Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
Ironguard Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
Ironbelcher Organ Gun
Ironbelcher Organ Gun
Ironbelcher Organ Gun
Steel Behemoth – Golloch’s Fury [1]
Stone Priest – Ej Periscope, Knowledgeable, Radiance of Life, Celestial Restoration (3), Hex (2)
Dwarf Lord on Large Beast – Orb of Towering Presence
Dwarf Lord – Wings of Honeymaze
Faber Ironheart [1]
*Ironclad Horde – Throwing Mastiff
*Bulwarkers Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
*Bulwarkers Regiment – Throwing Mastiff
*Standard Bearer
16(28)

Seems good! A very hearty Dwarf list that shares many similarities with what in 2024 would become The Dwarf List, including the obligatory formation. Note that this is pre-Clash so none of these Dwarfs have ordered march. I hadn’t faced Organ Guns in a couple of years and can’t say I was too excited about facing three 😅 But at least they’re a known quantity, and probably worse than the triple Sharpshooters that have replaced them? Either way, I drank my energy drink and prepared to slam forward.

We played Salt the Earth, with the Hallow going first, one way or another.

BATTLE

I wouldn’t say my plan going in was to roll the right flank up, but that’s kind of what happened. I burnt the two rightmost tokens in the opening turns before ignoring the Beast Lord and churning through the Dwarfs to the right of the Organ Gun battery. Top marks to the Forest Warden who held up an entire Shieldbreaker horde (the CS1 kind) and lived, buying the Lycans time to blend an Ironguard regiment in the flank and then utterly body the Shieldbreakers to the front. We’re talking like 16 damage out of 18 dice. The Lycans would go on to kill the Beast Lord for good measure and score a point, free of damage. Total chads.

If I had a plan, it was to force through the left flank with double Brute hordes (arguably triple on that half of my deployment) and crumple the Dwarf line side on. I kept hitting speed bumps on the way in – Faber threw himself forward, which took two rounds of Bruting to clear up, and the classic flying Dlord did what flying Dlord’s do, blocking another Brute up (for a single round) – but my dice didn’t help. You’ll notice that that one horde of Shieldbreakers over there took the entire game and three rounds of Brute attaks (90 dice total) to go down. The snake eyes was certainly responsible but these guys really blunted my aspirations for that flank.

As for the center … the Dwarfs shot off my Tribal Spear horde first turn, which lit even more of a fire than I already had. I took his Ironclad horde in response, and we started trading back and forth, with Golloch bouncing around running my hammers over. But he got his own when my Lycan Alpha fear charged the big dude, delivering 10 or so damage and dunking the legendary contraption. The Alpha would end the game hard-modeing into the front of the last Bulwarkers, eventually killing them too, as a Tribal Spear regiment waded through the Organ Guns. With the Dwarfs tabled and the Herd on 5/5 points, this was a full points …

HALLOW VICTORY

It’s hard to say what went so wrong for my opponent – I don’t recall his dice being woefully bad (I’m the one who rolled snakes!) and his list has plenty of Dwarf Good Stuff in it. He was going to struggle a bit on the scenario but then again his Organ Guns were deployed to punish the tokens he wasn’t playing for, so well planned there. Mostly I’m surprised by how much I have left on the board, my Herd is usually pretty mangled come end game … All the same, the big win felt good and hopefully the dude learned some stuff from me getting all positional on him. He did go on to win the Best Sports trophy, which was well-deserved (and paid for in the blood of his Dwarfs, I imagine).

GAME 5: EMPIRE OF DUST

Skeleton Spearmen Horde – Hammer of Measured Force
Skeleton Spearmen Horde – Dragonshard Shield
Enslaved Guardians Horde – Blessing of the Gods
Enslaved Guardians Horde – Boots of Striding
Mummies Regiment – Brew of Haste
Mummies Regiment – Helm of the Drunken Ram
Mummies Regiment – Mead of Madness
Mummies Regiment – Pipes of Terror
Soul Snare [1] – Drain Life (9)
Monolith [1] – Surge (8)
Idol of Shobik [1] – Heal (5)
Ahmunite Pharaoh – Eternal Guard, Knowledgeable, Surge (8), Host Shadowbeast (3)
Cursed High Priest – Wither and Perish (3), Weakness (3)
Cursed High Priest – Ej Periscope, Hex (3), Weakness (3)
14(28)

Remember how the Dwarf player last game was roped into this tournament by his brother? This was his brother. Through the magic of tournament rankings, this guy would have the chance to reap sweet vengeance on the Herd what tabled his sibling … and frankly his list looked up to the task. Mummy regiments drive me a little crazy, so four it is. Spearmen hordes are particularly good against Herd (RIP my TC) and he’s got the full allotment of legends (remember that pre-COK Rahs wasn’t taken and (hot take) Sebekh-Rei has always been mediocre). That is a wild number of items but 2600 points be like that sometimes.

We played Dominate to end the tournament, with the Empire going first. The shot below is juuuust into his movement phase, those Mummies weren’t scouting (Mummies didn’t do that in 2023 :P). Also check out that terrain! What a map to play Dominate on when you’re a slow death blob being surrounded by angry tree creatures. Luckily the Stampede strides …?

BATTLE

I’d argue the play of the match happened at the top of Turn 2, when the EOD yeeted the Pharaoh (on foot, mind you!) into a Brute horde, cast Host Shadowbeast, rocked the damage (8-10 out of 10 possible) and then hot rolled the rout twice, removing the Brutes. To make matters worse, I had to put a second Brute horde into the Pharaoh to end his reign of terror, which cost two turns of grinding thanks to rough Nv dice on my part. This severely blunted my momentum down the middle and was all around a great move on the Empire’s part.

Of course, my game was always going to be about hunting for flanks and trying to crush the dusty heart of the EOD blob. To that end, I was forced to take hindered charge after hindered charge, with the obvious exception of the Stampede … who weren’t off the hook tho, spending every turn Weaknessed. Eventually I used the Centaur Chieftain to kick every Cursed Priest he could reach, stopping some of the Weaknessing, but once again my precious momentum had been robbed and the grind fully entered. You can taste my desperation clicking through the photos, especially on the right flank where I just couldn’t get through those Enslaved Guardians and Mummy regiment, even with him snaking the Stampede.

That said, the Herd did get work done, particularly when the surviving Brutes made it into combat. Even hindered, the Lycans were able to lift two regiments of Mummies, and eventually juked Shobik to flip over a Spearmen horde come end game. Thankfully the game ended here, with my 10 US to his 8 (the last of the Mummies were juuuust out). Which by Dominate rules meant this was a …

HALLOW VICTORY

What a grinder to end the tournament. I felt ok going in and was ready to hard roll my way through, but I don’t think I was mentally prepared for how painful that much hindering and Weakness would actually feel to push through. On top of the Pharaoh’s hero charge! Also a note on clocks in this game and last: I’m almost sure we went to time and had some spastic last turns. You can tell by how my dice are everywhere when I’m taking the photos 😉

And that’s a wrap for Orc Town 2023! A fairly cursed first day followed up by trouncing two brothers put me somewhere in the bottom third. So be it. I scored a couple treasures from the raffle afterwards, including this gem from the curling club’s bathroom that now lives in one of mine:

All hail Skullface!

UP NEXT: The King Beyond the Wall IV – The Thing Beyond the Wall