~600 point Kings of War battle report.
Introduction
This battle is part of the Mighty Empires campaign that I have been chronicling on this blog. The Storm Lords' army, once again commanded by Delera Omaren IV, is trying to retake a village seized at the start of the summer by a Sulatar force.
Delera Omaren IV, one of the Storm Lords that rules Stormreach, is personally commanding the army that is hunting down the Sulatar. She has commanded in several small field battles in previous years of the war, though not against the Sulatar. At her command is a force of around 1000; humans are the largest group, but with the usual mix of races typical of human kingdoms in Eberron — gnomes, elves, dwarves, and halflings. Most of her force are Stormreach guards, mostly newer recruits trained during the winter; but around one third of her force are poorly-trained levies recruited from refugees at the Stormreach docks desperate for work — or press-ganged from its slums.
- 2xShield Wall(20) — Stormreach guards
- Militia Mob 1xRegiment(20) 1xTroop(10) — levy
- 1xCrossbowmen(20) — guard crossbows
- 1xMounted Scouts(5) — mounted guard patrol
Defending are a force of around 500 Sulatar drow. They are led by Nadan Zolavar, who has experience fighting the humans from the battle of Cinderfall last year. His drow are experienced warriors, better used to fighting in the wilds of Xen'drik than the Storm Lords' recruits.
- 1xKindred Archers — Sulatar archers
- 1x Kindred Spears — Sulatar warriors
- 1x Silverbreeze Cavalry — Sulatar mounted scouts
- 1x Stormwind Cavalry — Sulatar noble shock cavalry
Although outnumbered, the Sulatar are the stronger force — on paper. Their cavalry gives them more flexibility though.
The Battle
Deployment
The Sulatar decide to use the hill for their infantry, anchoring their left flank on the woods on the downslope. On the right, their cavalry have a lot of work to do.
The Storm Lords win the initiative roll and choose to go first — they want to rush the enemy main line.
Turn 1
Delera wastes no time in ordering her infantry to march forward to seize the hill in the centre of the battlefield. If her troops can establish themselves there, they have good control of the field; the Sulatar will surely contest it, and the fight there should be decisive. Only her right flank can advance rapidly though, as the rest of the infantry have to pick their way out of the gully that crosses their part of the battlefield.
The Sulatar archers appear before them, emerging onto the crest of the hill where they will make their stand. Immediately the skilled drow archers begin raining arrows on the leading guard regiment, causing some casualties and disorder. Meanwhile, on the Sulatar right, their light mounted archers sweep towards the Stormreach guard patrol holding the enemy flank, their arrows causing losses for the guards, but more importantly screening the flank of the heavy cavalry which takes up position to harry the Storm Lords' advancing infantry.
Turn 2
The Stormreach patrol cavalry meet the advance of the Sulatar mounted archers by charging and engaging in melee, but they cause few casualties. The infantry just keeps advancing; there is a troop of levies making their way through the woods on the right in a flanking move, while a larger force of levies advances on the Sulatar archers and a regiment of guards moves up to meet the elven spearmen. The crossbowmen are holding back as a reserve, and the other unit of guards is sheilding against the Sulatar cavalry.
The drow archers turn their attention to the advancing levies, and as the range closes, the veteran archers start picking off targets with deadly accuracy. Their formation soon collapses and the survivors turn and flee. To the left of the archers, the drow spearmen charge the guards that have just crested the hill, hitting them just as the levies to their left start to flee; the guards, already disrupted by the earlier fire of the archers, take heavy losses and also break and run.
Meanwhile, the cavalry charge into the other block of guardsmen, hitting them at the gallop in the open — assisted by the light cavalry, which breaks away from the fight with the guard patrol and charges into the flank of the exposed block of guards. The guards take heavy casualties and their formation is badly disrupted, but they stand their ground.
Turn 3
Things are going badly for the Storm Lords. Half of their infantry has been driven off with few losses by the Sulatar line on the hill. Their crossbowmen now begin shooting into the formation of Sulatar spearmen advancing down the hill, causing some losses but not slowing their advance. The spearmen charge into them, causing heavy losses and quickly routing them also.
The patrol cavalry charge into the rear of the Sulatar horse archers, causing losses but failing to break their formation.
The guardsmen in the centre cause some losses to the Sulatar heavy cavalry, but their formation is broken and, with the armoured drow knights riding through their formation hewing down guards left and right, the remaining guards break and flee.
The levies in the wood advance to the edge, but are met by a hail of arrows from the advancing archers, and wisely decide to halt their advance and instead beat a hasty retreat. The battle is clearly over — the Storm Lords have little left.
Post-Battle Analysis
The Storm Lords got mangled once again by the Sulatar archery line, but this time they did not have the numbers to break it. Instead their army is comprehensively routed.
It should be noted that this is too small a battle to be considered a reasonable test of the KoW rules. I like the Kings of War fluff, but it still seems to me like a system designed to give an excuse for marching around those big beautiful blocks of Warhammer miniatures (and don't get me wrong, one should definitely have an excuse to do that!) on a table rather than producing an interesting wargame. It is certainly quick and decisive, but battles seem to dissolve into a pile-in where everyone tries to charge every round to get their attacks in. I may be missing something. I wanted to give it another go as I own and like the rulebook, but I have not really had a battle that felt satisfactory using these rules.
Consequences
KoW is a more Warhammer-like system which tends to have very high casualties, so I will follow the ME rules for resolving consequences for Warhammer — just halve the casualties for both sides. (Technically, I should have allowed the Storm Lords to get tabled, but that's dull). That gives 210 points of losses for the Storm Lords, and 60 points lost for the Sulatar.
The Storm Lords' attempt to retake Brekkur is repulsed and the Sulatar remain in place there.
