Hold tha' groond!

This week my happy band of Anglo-Danes headed oop north past Northumbria and came across ae olde bande o' Hibs fitba faens aka Scots. My band looked as follows

Warlord with Dane Axe
4 x Hearthguard with Dane Axes
4 x Hearthguard with Dane Axes
4 x Hearthguard with Dane Axes
4 x Hearthguard with Dane Axes
8 x Warriors
8 x Warriors

My Hearthguard were combined into two units of eight.

Facing them were these flowers of Scotland

Warlord
4 x Hearthguard
4 x Hearthguard (both combined)
8 x Warriors
8 x Warriors
8 x Warriors
12 x Levies

The first few turns were uneventful, I had a lucky opportunity to use Lords of Battle and inflict some fatigue, and cancel the odd activation. Combat began on the right flank with two units of warriors, the Scots diced defensively and took two casualties to no loss for mine. The Scot levies opened up with their bows, nailing two of my hearthguard.

The Anglo Danes is a defensive bunch, but I could no longer hold back and went barrelling into a unit of warriors with my warlord and a unit of warriors. The Scots lost all but one and fell back. More units got dragged in, the Scot hearthguard were wiped out. My warlord was very nearly killed and only just managed to draw enough human shields to take his hits for him from the hearthguard and warriors. While he and his hearthguard were celebrating a unit of Scot warriors went barrelling into them. Due to impressive girth of my Warlord, two hearthguard were unable to fight and so five of them desperately holding off a full band of warriors. The Scots clearly offered a fine sixty-year old single malt to the dice powers because the dropped the whole unit for no loss themselves.

I burned a lot of activations in the last two turns resting my warlord and then charging him and the remaining hearthguard into fights. The last turn consisted of my warlord resting twice and then charging into a unit of levies behind a hedge. He managed to kill a few while another ability forced the remaining levies to roll under their armour or be removed as casualties added to the pile of bodies.

The end result since both warlords survived came down to victory points, and after their superb slaughtering of my hearthguard it ended closely as a 15-17 victory for them.

The Scots have some amazing abilities, such as Barrier of Spear, Reach and Hold the Ground. His unit of eight hearthguard launched an attack of thirty-two attacks on my charging warlord and hearthguard, twelve of them directed at the warlord, which he very very nearly didn't survive.

Lesson learned, with the Anglo Danes hold back and keep adding fatigue. Use the ability to change dice to helmets to keep playing Lords of Battle. It costs two dice but your opponent needs three activations to rest them off. Don't engage too early.