The Last Stand of the Men of Dor-lomin
Today we got together to play a battle from Tolkien’s Silmarillion inspired by an article by Graham Green in Miniature Wargames 436. I’ve been adapting my Middle Earth collection for First Age battles recently and this was a good ‘un!
The scenario was set at the end of the Fifth Battle; the forces of Angband are victorious and only Turgon of Gondolin’s elf army remains in the field. Hurin and the Men of Dor-Lomin offer to fight a heroic rearguard action to allow the elves to escape to fight another day.
We followed Graham’s article with Hurin and his brother Huon defending two fords on the River Sirion in the Fen of Serech from the horde of orcs, but I decided to add in a curve ball: Ecwith (a fictional cousin of Ecthelion of Gondolin) and his elven horse archers had become stragglers, and would be randomly deployed at the start of the game in between the river and the orc host. So the orcs had an added objective, though of course the elves would need to make a break for the fords...
I decided that the orcs should outnumber the good forces at least 2:1, and I was surprised just how many orcs/ goblins/ wargs/ trolls were hiding away in Tom’s soldier shack and in Martin’s collection! So much so that it didn’t all get on to the table, but we managed to field:
12 orc soldier units
6 orc archer units
2 troll bodyguard units
3 warg rider units
2 orc captains
1 Werewolf captain
and Gothmog, the Balrog
Facing off against them were some of my Saxon collection (doing double duty as Hurin and co):
2 bodyguard units
4 warrior units
4 archer units
plus 3 champions : Hurin, Huor and Huanach.
The rules were my own that I’ve been testing with various mythic/ fantasy battles recently. We set victory conditions: that the orcs should break through one or both fords by Turn 8, and would gain extra points for capturing heroes and destroying the Elf stragglers; the good forces needed to prevent this.
Martin and Tom split the forces of Angband between them while I took command of the elves and men.
By ill fortune, the randomly-deployed elves ended up close to the warg rider units, and despite some defensive bowfire, found themselves facing bad odds in the middle of the field. Ecwith’s horse archers were pushed back into a bend of the Sirion and destroyed, with Ecwith himself captured and dragged back to Angband! 1-0 to the orcs. The other elves escaped.
Now it was down to business at the fords. Tom had pushed forwards the Werewolf with a significant orc host towards Hurin’s ford on the right flank and were quickly engaged. Despite giving ground, Hurin managed to challenge and slay the fell captain. However, he was left facing yet more orcs as Gothmog himself came forward to lead the attack on the ford.
On the left, the orc advance was more piecemeal, broken up by the marshy ground and the skirmish with the elves. Orcs had reached the ford but been driven back by a stout defence with plenty of men waiting in support. Huanach the Champion fell in combat, but Huon stepped forward to steady his wavering men and managed to halt the orcs, though suffering a wound in the process. With the men on the verge of breaking, Huon boldly challenged an orc captain to try to raise morale, but it was too much for him and he was beaten down
and drowned under the weight of armour and wounds in the bloodstained water.
With that, it was game over, with a mighty victory to the orcs- both fords captured by Turn 6, some elves routed, two heroes captured and two slain, although Hurin had laid low one of Morgoth’s feared Werewolf captains.
I’m already back planning the next expansion to the Silmarillion collection and I think we all enjoyed an opportunity to dust off the orcs! The rules worked a treat with hardly any issues, and we managed to play through a decent sized battle in two hours.
Welcome, Guest. Please 
April 26, 2024, 02:05:32 PM
