998YK: Nymm, Lharvion 1

Nymm

Hammerhead Clan

The dwarves advance with their armies in the centre of the map: banner 2 moves towards the Storm Lord's cities in the centre of the map, and banner 4 tries to find a path across the river but fails its scouting roll.

In the west, on the border with the orcs, the Hammerheads need to decide how to proceed with the attack. The orcs have regrouped and now outnumber their spearhead force, and they have a Storm Lord army behind them occupying Threnal. So the Hammerhead dwarves decide to split their army, sending the smaller force to try to loop around to the orc capital from the west, while the larger army marches back to Threnal. They are able to scout both tiles, learning the strength of the Storm Lord's banner (only 450 points after their subsistences losses last turn). Badly outnumbered, the Storm Lord's force has to withdraw, and the only tile they can withdraw to with relative safety is the barren tile that they just came from — risking starvation again. Threnal is back in the hands of the dwarves, and they march banner 3 towards it as well ready to help defend it.

In the east, banner 5 scouts the fortress taken by the Sulatar last round. Finding that the Sulatar are outnumbered, they decide to advance, threatening to lay siege to it. The Sulatar are outnumbered here (600 points to 500), and have a hard choice — retreating into the fortress is very dangerous when they have no food for the rest of the season, fighting looks bad (they are outnumbered 600 points to 500), and withdrawing would leave them stranded in barren tiles again with no food. So they decide to fight — and it goes badly (see the previous post). So they are driven back to the neighbouring tile.

998YK during Nymm, after the Hammerhead's turn

There is a lot happening right now, so let's get a mid-turn map and some banner sizes here. I'll keep this concise, so B1 for banner 1 etc. Remember that ME banners can be between 500 and 1500 points to start with and never exceed 1500 points.

Hammerhead Clan B1: 1500, B2: 700, B3: 600, B5: 530 B6: 1080
Sulatar B1: 1250, B2: 1120, B3: 330
Storm Lords B1: 1487, B2: 500, B3: 800, B5: 450
White Fang Tribe  B1: 1387, B3: 1400

Sulatar

Banner 3 rolls a 5 for its subsistence check, so it survives in the barren tile without taking further losses. The Sulatar order it to withdraw, since it cannot stand against the duergar force that just defeated it.

On the south side of Searing Heights, the main Sulatar armies are trying to drive off the Storm Lords' armies. They have the advantage of numbers, but these armies are so close to their capital that one Sulatar army must stay back to defend it, and neither of the armies is large enough to drive off the main Storm Lord army unaided. So, with banner 1 they strike at the smaller Storm Lord banner, which just retreats — so the Sulatar regain the village of Firebranch that they lost last year. The other banner just scouts and seizes a neighbouring village from the Storm Lords; it needs to link up with the remains of banner 3 before it can do anything more than screen the capital.

Storm Lords

Banner 5: stuck in a barren tile again, loses 30 points to starvation and disease. It moves west into the White Fang empire, taking over a village so that it can subsist there next month.

Banner 3: tries to move back north, but it gets a bad roll and its scouts go missing, so it is stuck in the southern of the two central cities.

Banner 2: has to move west to defend the northern of the two central cities before the Hammerheads steal it; it manages to cross the river and makes it into the city, but has to leave its baggage behind.

Banner 4: moves back towards the capital — the Sulatar are threatening to move towards it with their banner 1.

Banner 1: things are looking a bit scary if the Storm Lords do not bring their main army back west to act against the Sulatar army now camped at Firebranch. If the Sulatar do march south, it might become necessary to abandon a lot of territory to defend the capital. So, while risky, banner 1 moves north-west against Sulatar army 2. The Sulatar choose not to contest this and retreat to their capital. The Storm Lords' troops burn the village to the ground; they know they are unlikely to be able to hold on to it, and if the Sulatar do retake it by force they will not be able to support their army there.

White Fang Tribe

The Hammerhead forces attacking their empire have divided their force, so the orcs decide to do the same — they cannot leave either invading army unchecked, as either can strike right into the heart of their empire with their remaining moves. So banner 3 moves east to join up with the Storm Lords' army that is now camped at the edge of their empire. And banner 1 moves against the Hammerhead army heading west, which finds that it is outnumbered and chooses to withdraw. The orcs have blocked this line of attack for now, but with Hammerhead banner 3 reinforcing their attack next turn, it will be hard to continue to hold all of this territory.

End of Nymm

Lharvion

Hammerhead Clan

Banner 4: has not advanced far enough to get into the action this year, so turns back home instead.

Banner 5: captures the last Sulatar-controlled village in the north.

Banner 1: scouts seize the undefended barren tile to the south of Threnal, but the banner itself stays to defend Threnal.

Banner 2: seizes another Storm Lord-controlled village in the central part of the map.

Banner 6: will fall back before the White Fang army in the west if it continues to advance, but is waiting for now.

Banner 3: tries to join up with the banner 1 to help defend Threnal, but fails its scouting roll — bad weather prevents the banner from moving. That leaves the city vulnerable to attack…

Sulatar

Banner 3 continues to fall back to the capital.

Banner 1 was moving west, to try to take the river crossing, but it would be madness to continue with that move now the Storm Lords' larger banner 1 is behind it — it could get trapped into a fight with the larger army, or worse with several of the Storm Lords' armies in this area, and might get cut off in the winter. So instead, they turn the tables on the Storm Lords, with both banner 1 and 2 attacking together against the invaders. The Storm Lords wanted to retreat if this happened, but they roll a 1 on their attempt to avoid battle. Disaster! — they will have to fight against the combined strength of both Sulatar armies. This could get messy.