Blood in the Badlands. Week 16. The storming of the flying fastness!

Standing upon the Arcane Fulcrum, the Butcher Bloodsky had an unprecedented view of the battle field below him.

Four great armies were arrayed beneath him.

The Fey Folk in their glittering armour stood upon the walls of the occupied flying fastness.

Across the field a mass of green allies(?) bellowed into the morning mist, their challenge resounding across the vista.

To his left the sodden Skaven shivered in the morning chill; or was that fear from having to run the gauntlet to gain the flying fastness?

Directly below him, the sweating mass of his Guthook tribe had mustered, their greedy eyes scanning the feast of flesh before them.

The Butcher Bloodsky looked up and scanned the sky above him. He studied the alignment of the slowly dwindling stars, met the eye of Captain Guthook and nodded his head in affirmation.

The stars were aligned, the portents from the heavens were good, the final battle could begin!!

This Sunday finally saw the four generals of the Badlands meet to contest the final battle of the Badlands to win Fozzriks, flying fastness!

Lee set out his mass of troops

The sweating mass of the Ogres arrayed for war.

The skittering Skaven prepared to advance.

Within the Flying Fastness the Elves prepared to defend the walls against the forces of evil arrayed before them.

The Elven Mage stood defiantly upon the central fulcrum.

At the first opportunity the Elven Dragon princes sallied forth and clashed with the encroaching Orcs.

The Orc Idol has a close encounter with a large rock.

The Skaven advance aggressively and crash into the flank of the Ogre Ironguts.

Having destroyed the giant arachnid the Dragon Princes are close enough to the Goblins to unleash their fanatics.

The fanatics tear through the princes in a whirlwind of swirling destruction and decimate the flower of the elven cavalry!!

In turn one my Butcher Bloodsky had used his power scroll to force through a 'Comet of Casandora'.

I figured this would force Lano to flee the Fastness so I could hit him on the counter charge.

Lano had decided to stoically hold his ground and remain within the Fastness.

As the magic phases had ticked away the force of the comet had steadily grown.

This turn would see it come thundering to the ground with devastating (strength 11) force!

Here is how the fastness looked before the hit.

Somehow the Elven Mage makes every one of his 3+ ward saves to survive the massive impact of the comet . . . . . .

. . . . . . However the rest of the Elves are not so fortunate and the remaining force of Elves is absolutely decimated!!!!!

Here is how the Fastness looked after the hit!!

It gets a little uncomfortable in the shed as it all goes a bit quiet after this and Lano repeats "it's fine, it's fine" over and over again!

I am well and truly in Lano's gun sights now and it's only turn two!

OPPS.

Back on the left flank I manage to see off the rat swarm but fail to run it down as it turns to flee.

My second Firebelly uses his flying carpet to get behind the Skaven hordes and use his flame breath to start whittling away the Skaven Stormvermin.

The Skaven advance continues and Lee uses 'hand of Gork' to finally get his Boar boys moving.

The rest of Lee's forces remain kettled up on the starting line due to a combination of failed animosity tests and Phil's use of his giant rats to stifle his movement. . . . . .

Or is Lee playing his usual game of sitting back and waiting for all the heavy lifting to get finished????

I wheel off half of my force to meet the slowly advancing Skaven.

In retrospect I probably should have used my Stornhorn and Mournfangs to do this but the original intention had been to crash them into the Elves as they fled the Comet.

With the Elves now decimated I probably should have taken the extra turn to reform my forces.

My original plan was to hold up the Skaven forces to encourage Lee to storm the Fastness.

I figured with the Orcs and Elves hacking each other to pieces my intent in the end game was to sneak my Ogres onto an undefended wall section and then rampage through the fastness in the final turns to claim as many objectives as possible to win the end game.

As it stood this was still my intent but I needed to nobble the Skaven to give me a fighting chance.

With this in mind as the Skaven Battlebus clashes with my Ogre bulls, I attempt to pluck the Grey seer from the bell with this 'disposable' unit.

Wounds are inflicted but it's not enough to kill the Seer.

I am forced to line up a flank charge with my Ironguts.

 The Skaven warmachine starts to power up . . . . . . .

. . . . . and then explodes in a giant mushroom cloud!!

Finally Phil has a 'that's so Skaven' moment ;0)

With my Ogre Bulls failing to assassinate the Grey Seer and fleeing from combat I am forced to engage with my Ironguts. I also decide to commit my giant to the melee.

My Firebelly uses his flying carpet to charge in on the Skaven fulcrum. Unfortunately the fulcrum stops the Firebelly utilizing his 'impact hits'.

Back on the right Lee continues to fail 'animosity' tests and just sort of mills about on his original starting line!

Being 'triumph and treachery' I do start to get a little paranoid and wonder if a cannon ball from my Ironblaster through their ranks would give them the kick up the arse they need.

Despite making a massive dent in the Stormvermin they remain unbreakable and Phil counter charges with his Abomination and plague monks!

Thankfully I have a plethora of protective spells cast.

This will help to keep them in the fight but they should really be attacking the walls instead.

To add salt to the wounds my Firebelly is beaten back by the Skaven engineer and the Vermin lord suddenly takes notice of the lonely Ogre!

Thankfully the Vermin lord is unable to squeeze in a charge.

Turn three rolls around and the Orcs are still on their starting line!

My trigger finger is getting really itchy!!

The decimated Elves continue to man the walls.

My rallied Gnobblars take a charge from the Skaven rat swarm.

Despite taking over thirty 'dangerous terrain' tests only a couple of rats die and my Gnobblars are chewed up and spat out in the ensuing combat!

Back in the swirling melee against the Stormvermin; my giant succumbs to his wounds . . . . . and then falls onto my surviving Ogre heros!!

Thankfully the protective spells still cast save their bacon.

Unable to break the bell or kill the Seer I decide to concentrate all attacks on the Stormvermin in the hope of leaving the Bell stranded without the supporting troops to push it forward towards the fastness.

At the end of turn three we decide to take a 20 minute breather to order some food in and clear the table of the various detritus and casualties from the battlefield, of which there was quite a bit!

Here is how the various forces had faired so far . . . . .

The Ogres had lost the flower of their infantry with the removal of it's Ironguts, but still had the majority of it's heroes on the field and strong contingents of long ranged attacks had survived the battle so far.

The depleted Elves continued to hold up in the Fastness and still had it's Swordmasters and Dragon fully intact!

A strong force of Ogre 'cavalry' continued to be a threat to any elves that dared to sally forth in their direction.

The Skaven battle bus had taken a massive dent but ALL the surviving Skaven units still continued to be a real threat.

Phil also had his Vermin Lord moving freely around the battle field unwounded!

Lee's Orcs had finally managed to get their act together and break free of being corralled . . . . .

 . . . . OR had that been his plan all along? . . . .

. . . . . and his horde of Orcs were still fully manned!

With food on it's way and cups of tea drunk we plunge ourselves back into the maelstrom!!

Lee makes an aggressive charge on his left flank!

Lano crashes out of the Fastness with his Swordmasters and supporting units to attack the large Orc horde threatening his walls!

Lee fails to inflict any kind of damage on the Skaven, giant rats but at least that has freed me from the combat with the Skaven units.

If I can get the jump ahead of Phil's Skaven, a good roll of the die could give me the chance to finally remove Phil as a threat from my side of the board . . . . COULD being the operative word!

An over view of the field shows have devastating the battle has been so far.

Everything remains balanced on a knifes edge!

Lano's swordmasters massacre the Orc horde . . . . .

 . . . . . and then set upon the Orc units behind!

I had hoped that this would have happened but REALLY wanted Lee's Orc's to have taken a much more devastating toll on the Swordmasters.

My original plan was to encourage Lee to mount the first assault and then use the mounds of corpses from both sides as a slope to enter the castle!!!

The supporting unit of Orc spears is absolutely MASSACRED for the cost of ONE Swordmaster.

So much for that plan of Lee and Lano wiping each other out!

What I really need now is my card to drop before Phil's

I figure I can use the jump to gun down the Abomination with ranged flaming attacks as well as get the jump in the magic phase to enfilade the  surviving Skaven with magic!

There are only two cards left in the pile. . . . . . Phil's and mine. . . . . . Phil holds out the cards for me to pick one . . . . . .

 . . . . . and of course I pick Phil's!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BOLL ORKS!!!!!!!!!

The Abomination crashes in on my Leadbelchers.

My only ray of hope is that the Firebelly is with the unit!

Then Phil decides to unleash his 'doom rocket' on my Tyrant and his Maneater body guards.

We measure the distance and Phil needs to roll EXACTLY 32 inches for it to land on the Tyrants heads.

What does he roll?

THIRTY TWO BLOODY INCHES EXACTLY!!!!!!!

This was how the battlefield looked . . .



But in Phil's mind it looked something like this!!!!!!

Thankfully I manage to destroy the Skaven Adomination and remove it as a threat!

With the jump on me Phil launches both his surviving infantry units back into the melee with my Heroes.

The Ogre Slaughtermaster is ripped limb from limb by 'Fell Blade Charlie' . . . .

 . . . . and my Ogre heroes REALLY want out of the combat.

A roll of twelve despite the re-roll sees them turning to flee from the combat.

They are pulled down by the Skaven plague monks as they turn to flee!

Desperate to get a toe hold on the Fastness before the Swordmasters return inside I decide to storm the walls with my Mornfangs!

Deprived of their impact hits and mounts they fail to make any real impact (pun intended) and are easily repelled from the walls by the defending Elves.

What really added salt to the wounds was that Phil had to leave after this turn!!!!!!

Why didn't he just slash my car tires on the way out to really rub it in!!!!!!!

It is not over between Phil and I ;0)

With the Skaven departing my surviving Ogres reform to face the Elves!

In an effort to stall the Elves so my Tyrant can get inside the fastness I commit everything I can to decimating the Swordmaster!

I could really do with committing my Tyrant as well but with the Swordmaster having a 2+ ward save to all magic attacks there is just no point.

Unfortunately my Stornhorn fails to make the charge as I would have LOVED to have seen that in action against the Sword masters!

If it had not already been confirmed with the massacre of the Orc unit, the Swordmasters show their worth and massacre the orges before they even get a chance to fight back!

Unable to reach my Ogres Lano content's himself with ripping apart what little remains of the Orc forces!!

At the end of turn six I have to face the reality that I am facing a full unit of Swordmasters as well as a dragon and I STILL need to get inside the Fastness.

With a heavy heart I am forced to sound the retreat and flee the field!!

The decimated forces remaining on the table show the verve with which this final battle was played !!!!

The triumphant Elven general surveys the bloodied remains of his once proud forces.

The triumphant Elves jeer at the surviving Orc and Ogre forces as they slink away from the fray!

The Flying Fastness remains in Elven hands . . . but was the cost worth it?

And here is the worthy winner. . . . .

Lano is all his Elven finery!!!

So that concludes the Blood in the Badlands campaign.

An absolute epic saga of courage, scheming and cups of tea!

Lano was without doubt the worthy winner and had played the whole campaign with the end game in mind.

He also deserved kudos for hosting and bookkeeping this entire campaign as well as managing to umpire several tables as once with rule checks!!

Top job mate and a well deserved win.

As to me. ....

Well my plan to force through the 'comet' with the power scroll bore much more fruit then I ever expected. . . . especially when Lano refused to abandon the Fastness before it landed!

I also managed to nerf the Skaven from entering the castle. It was not my plan for it to be at the cost of our mutual destruction.

As to my end game with Lee and Lano chopping each other to bits and then me using their dismembered bodies to ascend in to the fastness . . . . .well in this instance I flew too close to the sun!

My deployment and execution was not perfect and I made mistakes throughout the battle but my generalmanship has come on so much during this campaign it is not even funny.

To quote a very famous book  "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another."

Well the other generals were certainly the finest of iron!

Got to be honest there is going to be a bit of a longing glance back as I walk away from the badlands!