Off to chilly Wakefield on the last Saturday in April for the Beers of War (5) doubles Kings of War tournament. I had signed up for the Bolt Action event but that and the 40K games had been dropped due to a lack of players. I do have Kings of War Orc, Human and Lizardmen forces but these are all loosely magnetised to movement trays. They would not have done well on the 5km walk to the railway station. Instead I was generously offered the loan of a 1000 point Undead list, local sources informed me this was a pretty good line up but I would not have known. Chris Christopherson was lined up as my partner with a 1,000 point Forces of Nature list. There were some nicely painted models in that list although a Forces of Nature army could possibly be made up from bits of twig, moss and stones from the garden. We played 3 games each taking about 2 hours with an hour’s break mid-afternoon.
Starting positions for game 1, my lads are in grey with most of the tree huggers hiding in the woods. We are playing against Ogres and Basileans (or possibly goblins). Victory was judged on destroying the 3 most valuable units (not individuals) on each side. For us that was the big skeleton horde and 2 nature units. I took the task of going for the 2 regiments of green things at right below. The opposition had unsportingly lined up these key victory units behind 2 hordes of rubbish Goblins.
Our lads managed to hack through the goblins but took some damage in the process and went down to the Ogres behind. An eventual loss for our team but the final ‘death count’ was very similar on both sides.
Game 2 against Brotherhood and (another) Forces of Nature. The aim is to control the 2 hills through having more and bigger units close to each than the opposition.
Our boys surge over the victory hill and push the unpainted humans out of the way. The red flame thing caused our undead a lot of pain but we eventually saw him off.
Things went pretty well on my partner’s side of the table although that horde in the centre below could regenerate losses and caused considerable trouble.
End game sees a clearly held hill.
And the same story on the other flank for a win.
The last game depends on controlling 5 loot tokens (that cannot be moved). These are the brown cicular markers on the table.
We are fighting Dwarfs and Brotherhood and learn that Dwarfs are tough. My horde made little impact against the dwarf horde it was facing. We caught the green rocky things in the front of the image below in front and flank and still failed to drive them off.
End game shows the sole surviving undead unit, its commander. My partner also took a drubbing for a clear loss overall.
The Beers of War name does give some clue to the event and may have driven off some prospective players. Although some teams were clearly gunning for the most alcohol drunk award other players were sticking to coffee and soft drinks. Winning a game gave each team member a drinks token. Our game 3 opponents were really putting it away and I was hoping for a default win when they both passed out but they clearly knew how to play and gave us a good game. Only 1 player in the tournament seemed slightly worse for wear and the day passed in a quiet and civilised manner not requiring either police or medical intervention.
The Kings of War rules proved robust. Some of the scenarios and minor rules came from supplements that I had not seen but these were small changes and easily picked up. There are some key points to note that are not immediately obvious in the Kings of War rules. These are mainly concerned with who can see what. Everything has a height, models and terrain. You can’t see over an equal height obstacle or unit. To charge you need line of sight and a unit to your front. Careful rotating can decide if a unit can be in the 45 degree charge arc and that the target is close enough of the charger’s centre point to be contacted. No examples cropped up of obscure rules or strict grammatical rules interpretations that allowed events to take place that might not be immediately obvious. I brought along a copy of the rules but did not need to open the book let alone run a tooth-comb through each line to find a reference and interpret what it meant. A clear win for Kings of War as a gaming platform.
Gaming in Blackshaw Head 