The World Breaker Breaks

Sir Roderick is at it again.

I had some free time one morning and decided to play a few encounters of Demonslayer. Roderick defeated a demon lord in his previous outing so I reset the board and his health, and started again.

Here is his path, starting at the red star and ending at the red shield. Black X's mark encounters.

Here is the diary of his encounters.

I only planned to play a few encounters, but I kept going. I wanted to end with a good fight, but Roderick is pretty powerful now so combat was generally one-sided.

Finally, our hero reached an obelisk. With 3 clues, he could summon a demon lord. As it so happened, he got a third clue in an abandoned library in his previous encounter!

Enter Vorgath the World-Breaker!

I was confident going into this - Roderick actually had an advantage over Vorgath. Roderick had more hp, hit for more damage, and defended on an 8 or lower on 2D6. But he needed a 6 or less to hit the demon lord. Also, the demon lord's powerful blows could knock Roderick to his feet.

There was a stalemate early on - Roderick kept missing but so did Vorgath. But slowly Roderick whittled down his enemy. He also took some wounds, but he usually managed to stay on his feet. Thus, the advantage remained with Roderick.

Finally, the combatants traded hits. Roderick remained standing while Vorgath collapsed and disintegrated into nothingness!

Roderick has now eliminated 4 of the 6 demon lords!

And this game remains a great time-filler for when I don't feel like setting up anything more complex.

Some Roman Battles

I played around some more with Dominion of the Spear (DotS). In both scenarios, I used the standard army lists in DotS and played the games straight.

Battle of Cannae

I decided to pit Polybian Romans vs. Hannibal's Carthaginian army.

Setup

• Carthaginians (top) - battle line (L to R): armored elephants, armored spears, cavalry; reserve (L to R): cavalry, spears (I used a LI counter to distinguish the unit from the armored spears)
• Romans - battle line (L to R): 2 elite armored legionaries, cavalry; reserve: auxiliaries

Elephants at Cannae? Let's call it a what-if scenario.

The Battle

The Romans rout Hannibal's elephants (L) and cavalry (R).

Hannibal brings up his cavalry, which sacrifice themselves to destroy the Roman cavalry.

But the legions are too strong for the Carthaginian spears.

Rome rewrites history and sends Hannibal packing!

Battle of Carrhae

That was quick. I have enough time for another. How about Crassus' Marian Romans vs. the Parthians?

Setup

• Parthians (top) - battle line (L to R): 3 horse archers (I don't have LC so I used LI counters); reserve (L to R): spears, elite armored cataphracts
• Romans - battle line (L to R): 2 armored legionaries, 1 ferocious Gallic cavalry; reserve: armored legionaries.

The Battle

The Parthian horse archers wipe out 2 legions! But the Gallic horse routs the other horse archers.

The reserve legion moves up and stymies the horse archers while the Gallic horse ride over the cataphracts!

But the horse archers wipe out the remaining legion. The Gallic horse get revenge, but then decide to retire from the battle.

Much like the real Carrhae, Rome's legions are no match for horse archers!

A DotS Box Set

I am planning a small box set specifically for DotS. It will have 2 armies, the rules, a small board, and dice.

I plan to make counters specifically for DotS, with enough counters to cover any troop type. No more using LI as LC! For now, I'm using a couple spare armies from my MicroBattle set.

Another addition to the box is some terrain, as shown here.

There are no terrain rules in DotS but I think I can come up with something simple. Favorable terrain could give a defense bonus, akin to armor. As far as setup, I think I can use the rules from the 3x3 Portable Wargame as delineated in the first Portable Wargame Compendium.

And then there were three

Continuing on the fantasy theme, I completed another Demonslayer campaign.

It was another long campaign, with my hero Roderick wandering across much of the breadth of the land. I started at the red star. The red line shows his path and black Xs are encounters. The shield is where he ended.

You may notice the red X. It was an encounter I did in a previous game so I skipped it.

Here is the diary of Roderick's encounters.

Roderick finally met Khazrak, Beast of the Abyss. The game describes him as a "hulking, feral demon with the head of a ram and claws the size of swords."

Generated by Gencraft AI

He was big and slow, so Roderick was able to dodge most attacks. However, Khazrak was very powerful so it was difficult to score a hit. As a result, the battle went for many rounds, with Roderick unable to hit but able to dance away from attacks. Nevertheless, sometimes the combatants would score, and slowly their health drained away. At one point, both combatants were down to 6 hit points. But then Roderick hit with his magic (4 damage) sword and then avoided Khazrak's counterattack. Then Roderick struck the final blow, and Khazrak was no more!

Roderick has managed to take out 3 of the 6 demon lords!

The Circle of Thunder

A Ser Killian Micro Dungeon Adventure

Spoiler Alert - This is another adventure loosely based on D&D's Dragon of Icespire Peak. Even so, it may have some spoilers. You may not want to read this if you plan to play that adventure.

The Story So Far

After retrieving the sword of dragon slaying from the dragon barrow, our heroes return to Phandalin. There, they find a shaken Falcon, owner of the hunting lodge in Neverwinter Woods. He tells the party how a band of orcs accompanied by a giant boar destroyed his lodge.

"I thought we took care of that lot," Killian exclaims as he thinks of their adventure at the Woodland Manse.

"I fear not," replies Falcon, "and they are more dangerous than ever. Foul magic spurs their destruction."

Needless to say, Killian pledges to end the threat once and for all.

Approaching the Circle of Thunder

Falcon tells the party that he tracked the marauders back to a stone circle in the woods. He is too wounded to show them so he provides a map.

As our heroes approach the circle's vicinity, a band of blights attack. Killian and Haiden are wounded, but the party wipes out the blights.

Then they run into a band of orcs. The fight is a short and swift victory for our heroes.

Next, a corrupted tree lashes at them with its branches. Killian is wounded in the fight but they ultimately destroy the tree.

Finally, a pack of boars attacks, The heroes manage to drive them off without wounds.

Game Note: I used my Micro Dungeon approach, where there are essentially three levels - the first with 3 possible encounters, the second with 2, and then the boss. For this game, the wilderness approach to the circle takes the place of a formal dungeon.

Meeting Gorthok

Our heroes find the stone circle described by Falcon. In the center are 3 cultists chanting.

"Stop your vile proceedings!" commands Killian.

The cultists scoff and continue to chant. Then suddenly there is a clap of thunder and a massive figure the size of an elephant appears in the circle.

It is Gorthok, the thunder boar, avatar of the heathen god Talos!

The gigantic boar charges the party, bowling them over and knocking them to the ground. Despite this, Killian manages to score a strike. Black ichor flows from the beast's wounds.

Gorthok turns to charge again. Martin calls upon the power of Daeus and smites the beast with holy power. Enraged, Gorthok charges Martin, scoring him with its brutal tusks. Nevertheless, the fighters manage to score more hits.

Again and again, this pattern plays out. Our heroes adjust to Gorthok's pattern and they become adept at dodging the enemy charges. Every time, they score more hits.

Finally, the beast charges Haiden. He dives to the ground under the great boar and drives his sword deep into its vitals. It bellows in rage. Lightning crackles across its body. It begins to dissolve into nothingness, then with a crack of lightning it disappears!

The cultist priests stand shocked for a moment then flee.

"Shall we pursue?" asks Haiden.

"Nay," replies Killian. "This circle is the source of their power. Destroy it and they will no longer threaten the peaceful citizens of the realm."

With that, they proceed to tear down the stone circle. Martin calls upon divine power to shatter the stones then they scatter the remnants in the woods. It is done.

"Now we only have a dragon to deal with." announces Killian.

How will our heroes fare against the dragon? Find out next time!

GAME NOTES

That turned out easier than I planned. They did not use a single healing ability and they still had points to spare. Reasons for this?

• I based the adventure on the module, and other than Gorthok the encounters were not really that challenging.
• Still, I probably should have punched up the enemies' hit points a bit.
• With the way I run the adventure, the party has a chance to bypass some encounters. As it turns out, they avoided some of the more powerful ones - like more cultists and an ogre.
• I forgot to use some of Gorthok's special abilities.
• I also rolled extremely well for the heroes. Oh well, I guess they had some holy assistance.

DotS Mania

Looks like I have my first craze of the new year - Dominion of the Spear (DotS).

I wrote about DotS in a recent post. It is a time filler game - one of those games I can pull out and play in a few spare minutes.

Another Experiment

I tried another game of DotS. This time Romans (red) vs. Dacians.

• Dacians -  Battle line: spears, falx (ferocious foot) and archers. Reserve: falx. spears
• Romans - Battle line: legionaries (armored foot), archers, cavalry. Reserve: auxiliaries, legionaries

The Dacians attack. The spears (L) cannot make a dent on the legionaries. The Roman archers take out the falx, and the Roman cavalry rides down the Dacian archers.

The legionaries (L) wipe out the Dacian spears. The reserve falx wipe out the archers, and the spears and cavalry stalemate.

The Dacian spears finally drive off the cavalry, but the falx falls to the disciplined legionaries.

Victory for Rome!

As an aside, I decided to do Dacians vs. Romans because I am making a falx for my LARP.

Future Plans

I've been pondering what to do with DotS and I came up with some ideas.

Campaign?

I've been thinking about using DotS for a campaign but I have not made any decisions yet. Just too many interesting armies!

I'm leaning towards one option - sample games from different eras. Neil Thomas does this in his Ancient and Medieval Wargaming book, which includes battle reports for Kadesh (chariot era), Issus (classical), Badon Hill (Dark Ages), and Agincourt (medieval). I will likely break it out into more eras and use different battles.

DotS Box Set?

I am thinking about doing a separate box for DotS. I know, I just consolidated my gaming materials into a couple of boxes! Ah, the joys of GADD.

If I do this, I would only make 2 armies. Perhaps I can use some of the armies that I have on my consolidation chopping block.

I will need to create some more unit because I don't have enough to represent the maximum number for all the troops types. Here is a rundown on what I have and what I'll need.

• Heavy (melee) infantry - have 3, need 5
• Light (missile) infantry - have and need 3
• Heavy (melee) cavalry - have 2, need 4
• Light (missile) cavalry - have 0, need 6

I'm debating how to handle the cavalry. For MicroBattle, I only made one type of counter and then used markers to indicate if it was light or heavy. I am debating if I should do the same for DotS.

Note that DotS also has chariots, elephants, and camels. I will need to make chariot and elephant counters because my MicroBattle box does not have extras. For camels, I figure I can just use cavalry counters.

I also plan to make markers to indicate elite, armored, and ferocious statuses.

Christmas at Trenton

'Twas the morning of Christmas and all through the house, the early birds were stirring, looking for something that would not wake the spouse.

One of them (me!) decided to fight a battle. Naturally, Trenton came to mind.

Note: This was my Christmas Day entertainment. I have a backlog of reports from my holiday time off that I will post in January. Stay tuned. Now back to Trenton.

Background

It is December 1776. After losing New York City, the American revolutionary cause is in shambles. General George Washington decides on a bold offensive to (hopefully) restore morale. His army crosses the Delaware River and attacks an isolated Hessian outpost in the city of Trenton, New Jersey in the wee hours of the morning after Christmas.

Setup

Washington's Continental Army enters from the north (top). Washington starts with 3 brigades (Stirling, Mercer, and Fermoy from L to R) plus some guns, all under the command of Nathaniel Greene (the leader counter). Washington also expects 2 more brigades to join him.

Rall's regiment is on duty in Trenton. Lossberg's and Knyphausen's regiments are resting inside the town's buildings (they will come on in later turns).

The Battle

Alarm! Lossberg's regiment leaps to the defense, driving back Stirling's brigade. Washington's army ineffectually bombards Rall. Meanwhile, Stephens (upper left) and Sullivan (lower left) arrive and move to attack from the west.

Note: I am short of heavy infantry counters so I'm using light infantry counters for Stephens and Sullivan. Yet I treat them as standard infantry.

With a concerted assault, Lossberg is lost. Knyphausen's regiment joins the Hessian defense. Washington's artillery continues to be useless.

Rall drives off Fermoy (right). Knyphausen mounts a staunch defense, forcing Stephens and Sullivan to retreat.

Washington moves up his artillery while Stirling and Mercer ravage the town. Actually, I just knocked over a building. ;)

After a lot of bloodshed, the Americans drive back Knyphausen. Meanwhile, Rall's brigade routs and Rall himself is shot!

Surrounded, Knyphausen surrenders!

Game Notes

An American victory, albeit much bloodier than the actual fight.

The idea for a Christmas battle popped into my head on Christmas eve. But what battle? I wanted something apropos to the holiday, so ancients or fantasy did not seem right. Trenton then popped into my head. I tried to find a Command & Colors scenario but failed. Instead, I found this.

This is a scenario book from Greg Wagman of Little Wars TV fame (wow, I mention LWTV a lot on my blogs!). It has a Trenton scenario that I adapted to my MicroBattle rules.

Here is the link to the scenario book.

It's for a miniatures rules set called Live Free or Die.

Now that I have all these Revolutionary War scenarios, I'm tempted to do more for 2025.

Dominion of the Spear

I've been looking for some fast play wargames for quick games. You might remember my five minute fight experiments on my old blog. I also tried the 3 x 3 Portable Wargame but it did not click for me.

Anyway, I recently came across this over at Wargame Vault.

Dominion of the Spear (DotS) allows the player to complete a pre-gunpowder battle in a few minutes. You set your armies up into zones - left, center, right, or reserve. Then you roll attacks vs. adjacent enemies. A hit eliminates a unit. You can then fill in the line with reserves. Repeat until an army is down to 1 unit and has fewer units than the other.

Test Run

I decided to give it a test. Out of the 196 armies listed in the booklet, the Arthurian army caught my eye. So our first test is Arthur vs. Saxons.

Set-Up

The opposing armies:

• Saxons (top) - 3 units of spears and 2 units of ferocious spears (they get an attack bonus)
• Due to the lack of heavy infantry counters, I used light infantry counters to represent the ferocious spears.
• Britons
• top (from left) - spears, archers, and cavalry
• bottom (from left) - spears, cavalry, more spears

The Battle

Each turn, units in the front line fight. Combat proceeds from the attacker's right. In this case, the Saxons are attacking, so I start on the Saxon right (left side of the photo).

• Left - both are melee units so they roll simultaneously. The Saxon ferocious spears hit but the Briton spears miss. The Saxons overrun the Britons.
• Center - Saxon melee vs. Briton archers. Naturally, the archers get first shot. They miss. The Saxons attack and hit the archers. Charging through a hail of arrows, the Saxon spears smash into and rout the archers.
• Right - spears vs. cavalry. Both roll simultaneously. Both miss. A standoff.

The units with hits are removed. Arthur brings up reserves to fill in the gaps.

Turn 2:

• Left - Briton spears hit the Saxon ferocious spears.
• Center and Right - the Saxon spears destroy the cavalry units.

After removing casualties, the Britons have 2 units of spears left against 4 Saxons.

Turn 3:

• Left - the reserve ferocious spears hit the Britons.
• Center - both sides hit. Mutual annihilation!
• Left - Without anyone in front, the Saxon spears could perform a flank attack on the center Britons. But they've already been defeated!

And with that, the Britons fall to the Saxons!

Thoughts

Overall, I liked this game. Here are some reasons.

• It is quick. The above scenario took 6 minutes, including photo time.
• Armies are small - typically 4 to 6 units. Simple to set up!
• At first glance, it seems like it would be boring. There is no real maneuvering; just rolling dice. But using reserves to plug gaps satisfied my desire to move units around.
• I found determining the battle line and deciding which troops to put in the reserve to be a nice mental challenge that makes the game interesting.
• DotS includes 196 army lists from ancient to medieval times!

Obviously, there are some downsides.

• There is really just one scenario - line them up and fight.
• There are no rules for terrain.

I'm OK with these drawbacks. Big ancient battles seem to be of the line them up and fight variety anyway. And often they were fought on flat terrain. Still, I think it may be possible to add some terrain house rules.

Overall, I am pleased with my purchase. They achieve something that I've tried to cook up myself. And I really like the army lists! You may see more DotS battle reports!

What's in Store for 2025?

Every year I try to predict where my gaming experience will go. I'm usually way off base, but I find it fun to try.

So how about 2025? Let's peer into the crystal ball.

Here is what the wizard foresees in 2025.

• Micro Dungeon - I'm very close now so I suspect that I will have rules finalized for my quick play dungeon crawl / fantasy adventures game.
• More Killian - Assuming that Killian survives Icespire Peak, I'd like to continue his adventures. I have my eye on the Storm Lord's Wrath.
• More GADD - other than Micro Dungeon, I suspect I'll once again be all over the place in terms of games and eras. Not exactly going out on a limb here.
• Counter Consolidation - I previously mentioned consolidating my counters. I think it's going to happen.