Attack of the Warwitch

The fall of Borstov Landing has given Cryx a foothold in the southeast region.  As Khador's forces retreated towards Khardov, they were pursued by a Cryx force lead by a new and horrifying threat:  Cryx has committed warcasters to the invasion.  The Warwitch Deneghra caught up with the retreating forces and they were forced to turn and fight.  Fortunately Froese had rebuilt his Uhlan Cavalry and built our most powerful warjack to date:  the Kodiak.  As the most productive and highest ranking officer in the region, Froese also drew the attention of the legendary cavalry leader Kovnik Markov, who joined the cause under Froese's command.  Khador was lead in battle by Captain Josh Froese, Captain Rob Perkins, Captain Andy Schroeder and Sergeant Aaron Pauls, and their promotions are well deserved.
   The Cryx force approached from the south, and the battle took place near a forest and a wall.  Cryx had a unit of Mechanithralls with a full attachments of Brutes and a Stitch Thrall on their left flank, and the Warwitch Deneghra and her 4 warjacks on the right. Khador brought Matt's unit of officer-lead Iron Fang Pikemen and Schrag's Widowmakers to face the Mechanithralls.  The center was held by Schroe2a's officer-lead Winder Guard Infantry and Ben's Field Gun Crew.  Across from their warjacks we put Froese's Kodiak protecting Ben's Greylord Ternion.

Froese advanced the speedy Uhlan Cavalry around their right flank to try to setup a charge on the enemy 'jacks.   Kovnik Markov is the cool looking one with the warhead tipped lance.

On their left flank we worked to get shots with the Widowmakers while protecting against a counter-charge with the Iron Fang Pikemen.

The Warwitch wasted no time in making corpses of our forces.  She cast "Ghost Walk" on her 'jacks, allowing them to advance right through the wall and get into range.  The Defiler sprayed right through my Winter Guard Infantry, cutting my food bills down considerably.

Not intimidated, Froese's Kodiak charged the much smaller Defiler and made a nice little wreck marker out of it.  The Rocketeers and Field gun got some shots in as well, however the Helldivers were burrowed and could not be attacked.

On the other side, the Mechanithralls and the 3 Brute attached got up to the wall, making them harder to shoot.

On of the most effective guys for Khador this night was Ben's Manhunter.  He has pathfinder and charged through the forest over the wall and delivered the hurt to the Brutes.  With 2 axes each with weapon-master he killed 1 and badly wounded a second before they knew what hit them.  The two survivors tried to hit back, but his high defense made them miss three out of four attacks, and he survived with 1 health.  On his turn he finished of the last two Brutes.  The remaining Mechanithralls moved toward the center to try and get some damage done there against the Winter Guard.

The Iron Fang Pikemen closed with the Mechantralls and the Widowmakers moved to get shots from the side.  Froese moved his Uhlans further around to charge from behind.

On the right, the big Cryx 'jack - the Seether - ripped through the Winter Guard Infantry we placed like a meat wall in front of the Kodiak. The first Helldiver then surfaced and put himself in harms way to prevent the Kodiak from unloading on the Seether.  The Greylords proved ineffective against the 'jacks in this case, although Froese had some brutal dice in there...

The Kodiak wrecked the first Helldiver easily, but the Warwitch had an answer.  She moved forward and cast her "feat", which is a once-a-game ultimate.  Her's reduces the stats of all enemies within 14 inches.  She also cast "Crippling Grasp" on the Kodiak, and turned both the Seether and the second helldiver loose. The Kodiak's reduced armor gave way and he went down in a heap.  The Iron Fang Pikemen also suffered heavy losses on this turn to the Mechanithralls, all of which just served to make the Mechanithralls stronger as the Stitch Thrall made new guys from all the carnage.  At this point I thought things were looking bad for the home team.

Schrag's Widowmakers shoot the Mechanthralls needed to clear a path for Froese.  Only the Windowmakers and Kovnik Markov had been out of range of the feat, and they came through big time.  Kovnik Markov charged the Stitch Thrall, killing him to finally end the regenerating stream of guys protecting the warcaster.  His warhead lance did AoE on some other Mechanithralls as well, and suddenly the Warwitch was looking very vulnerable.

The slimy cowards took a cheep parting shot before running away.  Deneghra had the big 'jack trample the Greylords and the Helldiver ran to engage the Manhunter, clearing the way for her to make her gettaway into the forest.  She's a jerk, and she dealt a costly blow to us, but she was ultimately turned away thanks to the heroic efforts of the increasingly renown officers of Southwestern Khador!

Borstov Landing Falls!

   The Khador forces made there way south in response to the cries for help from Borstov Landing.  They arrived half-starved, disorganized and without an officer to lead the attack.  After a week of mustering their ranks, those who had not defected faced the terrible reality:  they were to late to save the castle.
   It was from in this grim situation that rose four heroes of Khador.  Sergeant Matt Schroeder, Senior Sergeant Josh Froese, Senior Sergeant Rob Perkins and Junior Sergeant Ben Hancock would not stand by and watch the resource stockpile from the entire southern region be pillaged by the Cryx invaders.  They staged a daring rescue, holding back the overwhelming enemy forces long enough for the garrison to escape, carrying with them the life-blood of the southern Khador army.  It was a costly engagement, but their promotions are well earned. Because of their heroic actions the Khador leadership has granted them and their piers control over the resources allocated to the southern defense effort.  These critical decision-rights will be key in forming the shield and blade that will repel the Cryx.

   Below is the detailed account of the rescue.

Here you can see Borstov Landing to the right and the siege army to the north.  The Khador army approached from the north-west.

The first exchange was the Crxy firing their catapults at the castle.  They destroyed the drawbridge but not the iron gate.

We approached with the shocktroopers through the open field while the Uhlan cavalry came through the forest undetected.

  We also deployed Froese's woodmen behind the enemy.  We had a good time making fun of how useless they are, but they actually did take out some dangerous back-row Cryx and split their forces some.

The battle took part largely in the forest, as the Cryx warjack and raiders charged blindly into the forest.  They ran into our guys trying to sneak up, including Froese's horses, which was a shame because they were not able to unleash their more powerful charge abilities.

The garrison inside the castle moved up and prepared to make a run for it when the time was right.

At this point the second wave of Cryx forces showed up.  We were worried we would not be able to push forward to the castle gate to enable the escape.  We were able to wreck the warjack in the forest though, with a nice combined melee attack from the Iron Fang Pikemen and big damage from the Manhunter.

Wrecking the 'jack enabled Froese to charge his horses at the new-comers.  They did huge damage to the second wave 'jack, ultimately completely disabling the very powerful Harrower.

Below you can see that Froese did end up losing his horses, although it was likely worth it.  Rob really wanted to get his Winterguard killed, (they eat to much!) so he had them charging out of the forest in to the teeth of the catapult barrage.  He actually ended up destroying one with a Rocketeer though.

Here we made a costly sacrifice, but with time running out it had to be done.  We ran our two 'jacks into the second wave to prevent them charging us.  This spelled curtain death for the warjacks, but it served to push the battle line closer to the castle gate.

The Greylord Ternion came through again in this battle.  Here they found gaps between the 'jacks to cast their magic attacks, catching several Bane Thralls and Bane Knights under them.

Next the garrison decided it was now or never if they were going to get out of the castle.  Below you can see them single-filing out of the gate to engage the second wave from behind.

Between the garrison attacking from behind, the Greylord Ternion's magic from behind the 'jacks and the shocktroopers, we eventually took down the second wave of Cryx forces.  The third wave was inbound though, and it was time to make a run for it.

Here we had to make more sacrifices.  Matt's Demo Corps and my Shocktroopers engaged the final units of the second wave even though we knew they would not be able to get away from the third wave incoming.  The rest of the forces and the garrison started making their escape behind the brave souls who gave their lives for Khador.

Unfortunaly, their heroic sacrifice resulted in a gruesome death...

Our second battle

Our Second battle was great great fun once again.  The Khador forces came down from the north to rescue a village under attack from the evil Cryx.  Here's Josh deploying our forces.  The grey and brown bad guys were Bane Knights.  They were high armor and could go through walls and got extra attacks.  Our plan was to run round through the forest to the east and stay away from the houses because they could close with our ranged units through the buildings.

Our fearless and stern officers are ready for battle.

The poor villagers were running for their lives...

At this point we're closing along the fence.  The baddies are waiting behind buildings.  We put Schrag's widowmakers in the front so they could shoot when the enemy decided to come out.  We put Rob and my winterguard on either side with Andrew and Matt's Greylord Ternion on the flank.  My shocktroopers held down the center.  You can see Jared's Doom Reavers in the distance there.  They double-timed it across the map so they had to join the battle a few turns late.  We decided also to take advantage of Anrew's Kossite Woodsmen's ability to deploy on a later turn, trying to find an opportunity to flank them.

At this stage Cryx pulled their first trick.  They had 2 Helldivers, who instead of attacking could burrow underground.  So they moved out and hid in range of our front line gunners.  This was bad because when they attacked they were able to engage some of Schrag's Widowmakers.

Throughout our advance the enemy Necrosurgeon was invading houses and making Mechanithralls out of the poor villagers.  We had to advance quickly, and in hindsight we got a little to close...

The Helldivers popped out right on top of our widowmakers and the Bane Kights charged.

This was our chance to get our shoots in and we needed to make them count.  Things went very badly, however.  Our left flank was a total loss, as you can see below they took cover behind the fence and our attacks from the Greylord Ternion, Winterguard and Widowmakers all missed.  Even the rockets and mortars were useless as they shrugged off blast dmg with their high armor.

The center of the line fared a bit better though, as my shocktroopers steped forward and wrecked one of the helldivers.  This free'd up a Widowmaker to fire, which proved very effective against the Bane Knights as they could ignore the armor with the snipe ability.  (below the round shields and red feathers are the shocktroopers and the rock is the wreck marker from the helldiver)

On the left flank things went quite well.  Without the fence for cover Andrews Greylord Ternion were able to spray whole swaths of the enemy lines, killing several per attack.  Rob's Winterguard used ranged combo attack and then his Manhunter charged the defiler on that side and wrecked it before it had a chance to shoot.
Things went from bad to worse on our left flank.  You can see below the Bane Knights have advanced over the fence and are cutting through Matt's Greylord Ternion and my Winterguard don't have long to live. We deployed Andrew's Kossite Woodmen at that point to help, (the green guys) however their bows did not fair real well agaist the high armor.  In the center the shocktroopers soaked up the damage and were quite awesome overall.  They killed their share but also kept them at bay for Andrew's Greylord Ternion to line up another round of devistating frostbite sprays.

We decided to send Jared's Doom Reavers around the back, but they took to long to get around and the battle was largely over before they made it.

After finishing off the guys in front of them, the shocktroopers formed up to take on the charge from our crumbling left flank.  Again they withstood the considerable damage output from the Bane Knights and held the line for the Greylord Ternion to do their thing.

 After the battle the villagers were very happy...

That is at least until Jared's Doom Reavers realized the battle was over and they didn't get to kill anything...

Our first battle

Our first battle was truly epic.   Bo was ready to get underway...

We were besieged from the north and east.  On the lower left are our units, after assigning them out we put them all in the castle.  The 2 units of Satyxis Raiders with a Sea Which leader were on the two ends of the enemy lines, and proved very effective against or  infantry.  They also shot the three catapults which inflicted heavy damage.  The Mechanithralls were in the middle concealed in the trees.  The Sea Which for the raiders and the concealment for the mechs meant we were forced to go out to engage them.

On the first turn the three catapults killed tons of guys in the castle.  Matt's Iron Fang Pikemen survived ok with shield wall, but Marc's mechanics and both a field gun and mortar where lost almost before the battle began.  Here we are putting some of the pikemen back in (after realizing they survived because of shield wall)  The places where you can see green in the castle are where guys used to be...

Jared and AJ charged their 'jacks out the west gate which Jared's mechanics in toe, and Froese lead the way out the east gate with his pikemen and officer.

The second wave of catapult fire brought down the north-east tower.  Unfortunately Matt's Doom Reavers were in the holding cells below (they terrify even their allies) and half of them were killed in the collapse.

On the west side, Matts pikemen followed the 'jacks as they engaged the raiders.  The raiders couldn't penetrate the armor of the 'jacks, but the 'jacks had no success hitting the dodgy raiders...

Rob's Winterguard Infantry also came out the west gate.  Retreat was not an option as the Mortar crew parked right in the doorway.  It was promptly destroyed by a stray catapult fireball.

At this point the Mechanithrals (with 3 Brute Thrall attachments each) emerged from the forest and prepared to charge.

The west gate force formed up with Schrag's Widowmakers supporting Froese's pikemen.  Ben's Kommandos are there also.  In the castle you can see that my shocktroopers are struggling to get down the stairs to get out to the battle.  Matt's surviving Doom Reavers charge out the hole in their cage.

On the west side, AJ's Juggernaut is still unable to make much headway on the raiders, but is undamaged, however Jared's Destroyer is shredded by the Brute Thralls. (they are the green guys)

The Mechanithralls sacrificed a couple guys to setup a charge into the Winterguard and devastated their ranks.  The Necrosurgeon and his minions dutifully made new Mechanithralls out of the corpes from both sides.  The Brutes continue to pound on Jared's Destroyer.  They used their *Combo Attack (a.k.a "Double Punch") to get through the armor and eventually scrapped the 'jack.  That was a huge blow to the good guys.

On the northern front Froese engaged the raiders.  This proved to be a very bad match-up for the pikemen. The high defense of the raiders coupled with their two attacks, one ignoring shield wall would later spell the brave pikemen's doom.  Schrag was only able hit the raiders with his aiming bonus due to the high defense and Sea Which +2 to ranged defense.  It looks like my shocktroopers are going to get out of the castle, but they change their mind at this point and go out the other door...

With some great rolling Froese did take out quite a few raiders, things looked good for awhile.  Aaron's shocktroopers (guys with the blue feathers) setup to defend the against the Brutes.  This turned out to be a very bad match-up as well.  The Brutes charged and "Double-Punched" through the shieldwall and ultimately crushed the normally un-killable shocktroopers.

Meanwhile my shocktroopers have finally gotten out of the castle...

Back on the north, however, things go south quickly as the Brutes run down the shocktroopers and Froese's dice go cold and the raiders overwhelm the pikemen.  Schrag shot one of Aaron's guys in the back of the head on accident.  Ah.. good times...
At this point Ben's Kommandos got their chance to shine.  The gassed the brutes and took them down.  It was an important point, however it would not be enough to keep the Mechanithralls of Schrag's Widowmakers....

The raiders finished off the pikemen and the Mechanithralls outnumbered Ben's guys whose ranks were diminished by catapult fire.  Once Schrags guys were engaged it was just a matter of time.  Eventually they became corpses for the Necrosurgeon...

On the west, AJ repairs his 'jack and my guys finally make themselves useful.  Rob gets around and rockets the catapult.  Things are looking up on this side...

The 'jack charged across the battlefield taking heavy damage from direct hits from the two catapults.  My guys did a conga line to slowly get over there.

AJ's 'jack continued to soak up the damage as waves of Mechanthralls changed him for boosed "Double-Punches."  Things looked bad there but he was able to get his mechanics up there to repair and keep it fighting.  My guys sacrificed one guy to setup the counter-charge and it looks like the shocktroopers where the right unit to fight those raiders.  Rob flanked the catapults, wrecking one and engaging the other. It was a huge move because I'm not sure how much more AJ's 'jack could have taken...

Rob sacrifices his last guy to engage the catapult and saves the Juggernaut.  The shocktroopers clean up the remaining guys.

The final blow mercifully came at nearly 1:00am, the exhausted survivors were vastly outnumbered by the fallen.  Khador is victorious, but at what cost?