Middle Earth SBG - Fords of Isen

A bit of a late post as this was my last game of 2019 but hey, that's the way things roll recently.

With the release of the recent War in Rohan supplement for Middle Earth SBG, Kev wanted to give the troops a try out and plumped for the ever popular Fords of Isen scenario to give the rules/stats a try out.

Myself and Alan plumped for the Evil side (as usual) and Kev and Ian taking the Horsemen s side for the encounter, with all the toys supplied by Kev as usual.

The game was it's usual very enjoyable affair with the evil side having to kill Theodred and have 12 bods on the other side of the river by game's end being a very tough nut to crack.

Luckily for us this time, Ian was the 'One King' and threw multiple 1's for much of the game and the Uruk Hai shooting was pretty effective when the Multitude of Rohan Mounted re-enforcements arrived being mown down as if facing machine guns.

Needless to say, the game was a ding-dong affair with much splashing about and only a couple of Uruks drowning trying to cross at the deep end and much heroics on both sides and Theodred refusing to die gracefully, but die he did in suitable style surrounded and alone on the evil side of the river and the evil side just managing to squeeze the victory on the last (twelvth) round of the game with having twelve bods alive and on the other side. Skin of the teeth stuff.

Anybody's game right to the end and a great way to end the year with. Look forward to more Middle Earth shenanigans this year.

Middle Earth SBG - Matched Play Second Helpings

Recently had a return to Middle Earth and had a re-fight of the Rohan vs Uruk-Hai game in a matched play game from last year (wow, didn't realise that was ten months ago).

Similar forces and table set-up with all the bits supplied by Kev again, but this time myself taking the side of Theoden and Dave K playing Lurtz. Different scenario with this one's objective to being to control five or more locations on the table (plus points for taking out important bods).

With both sides armies keyed to getting into combat quickly, the game started with a general rush to come to grips and Rohan getting the charge in to maximize impact of lots of cavalry.

The game then produced a similar clash of the two lines with a few Uruk-Hai dropping to a the fair amount of Rohan missile fire, and the Uruks managing to unhorse Theoden in the first round with their shooting.

The charge result of the Rohan cavalry was similar as before but much more pronounced this time with Rohan pretty much bouncing off the Uruk-Hai lines.

Not so much my bad dice throwing here, but Dave's very good dice rolling, with Rohan often failing to wound when getting the hits in, but pretty much every time Dave would get the 6's to wound so the combats for the three melee's tended to go one way for the whole game.

Dave didn't get it all his own way though and particularly on the Rohan left flank under Theodred did pretty much have it his way, but not sufficiently or quickly enough to make a difference for the overall outcome.

In the Centre and right of the line, Rohan were reduced to the individual hero's Theoden, Theodred and a Rohan Captain who, in the way of these things producing better results than all their forces combined and held the hordes at bay for a couple of rounds themselves and successfully denied the Uruks a couple of objectives by plonking their butts on the markers and refusing to die in good cinematic fashion.

In the end the game finished with the random game end being rolled on round 8 or 9 I think with the Rohan force broken (well broken) and almost all killed but with the dregs refusing to run away and the Uruk-hai still unbroken but claiming two objectives, it was an Evil victory though Rohan did claim the lives of all (2 at least) the Uruk-hai hero's in return. Theoden, Theodred and the Captain all surviving (though surrounded) till the last.

If it had been the scenario from last time, Rohan would have actually won on points even though they were pretty much all dead.

Another great and much enjoyable game and I am looking forward to the decider, though I note Rohan has lost on points both games (though narrowly) so far. Watch that space