Orc Turn 5
Things were pretty desperate here, for both sides. Orcs were one unit off breaking, the High Elves two, but the Orcs had much better organisation (for shame, High Elves).
The Orc Hero dragged the Wolf Riders towards the fight, but the forest remained a pain and prevented easy charges (A).
The Night Goblins were within initiative range of the Archers, but elected not to charge (sensibly, in my opinion). The Orcs were barely out of initiative range, and ignored the General's order to get into the fight (B).
The Giant charged the Eagle again, as expected (C). Unexpectly, the Eagle, with it's mighty one attack (Terror) won the combat! It did not pursue.
Point D has decided not to exist.
The Orc Shaman moved to get a nice line for 'Gotcha!' on the large elven infantry group. The spell was cast, but luck was not with him, only inflicting 1 hit on both archer units and nothing on the Spearmen (E).
The Goblin Shaman was going to cast Gotcha! from the other direction, but I informed my opponent that a unit could only be affected by the same power once per turn, and allowed him to use his roll for another spell (he had rolled a 6) (F). Unsurprisingly, he Foot of Gorked the smaller Archer unit, but again his rolling was poor, inflicting only 2 hits. A stand was lost, but the Archers lived!
Drive back was complicated here- the large Archer unit had only been hit by the Orc shaman, so its direction was simple. The other Archer unit was hit from two directions, but only one caused driveback. Nevertheless, I figured drive back should be away from the closest model (the Goblin Shaman), as drive back is normally away from the closest shooter even if that shooter caused no hits. This led to both elf Archer units colliding and becoming thoroughly confused.
High Elf Turn 5
The lone Eagle continued to home back to the Mage (A). In hindsight I should have sent it off to land on the Goblin Shaman, but was distracted by other plans.
The Mage ordered the Bolt Throwers to advance into range of the Orc Boar Boys again (B).
The General ordered one unit of Spearmen (those not in the woods) to move towards the Giant, and then, critically, managed a second order to charge! (C)
Finally, in case all else failed, he finally managed to get an order through to the Spearmen in the Woods, organising them into a snaking, defensive line to protect the side and rear of the Archers.
In the combat phase, the Spearman unit managed to beat the Giant by 3 (thanks to support), before following it up, surrounding it, and finally killing it (D)! The Orcs were broken!
In the shooting phase (yes, I'm reporting in a strange order) the Bolt Throwers and Mage again proved an awesome team, killing another Boar Boy stand and driving them off the board (suddenly my opponent was failing every save). We rolled to see what would happen to this unit, and the roll was a 1- it had fled!
Counting VPs, it was a very close game. The Elves only lost 3 units out of 9 (worth 310pts!) but had come very close to losing more (420 VP total). The Orcs lost 6 units out of 10 (520pts), but what remained was solid. Only 100VP difference!
The Orcs had performed very well, and if it wasn't for the forest I'm sure my Elves would have been quickly rolled over by the cavalry.
I was very happy with the game, and I think my opponent was as well. There were many odd twists and turns and it could easily have gone either way.
I really want to play more now, but no one here has models are have played before, so I need to supply everything and teach the game. I also have no more High Elves with me, so to play a 2000pt game per side I need to paint up 3000pts worth! (2000pts of an army I do have with me, +1000pts more of Orcs and Goblins).
Expect more small game reports, or Vassal game reports, I guess!
