Hi all.
I played a game of Song of Blades and Heroes with my partner last night. It was still a bit of a learning curve for us, but we've had great fun nevertheless. It was a close game too!
Anyway, we took a lot of photos during the game and I thought that writing up a battle report is pretty good way of documenting them.
My warband consisted of a scantily-clad barbarian lady and her goat-like sidekick. We've decided that the lady had come in possession of an amulet capable of raising the dead. She's heading for a dungeon where a number of catfolk were entombed, hoping to raise herself enough mindless soldiers to make a living off plunder. Her sidekick's an unwilling collaborator. They pick up a number of mummies that sprout from a barrow not far from the dungeon on their way.
The little lady's warband consisted of 5 catfolk archers, one of whom was a bit more advanced than the rest, 2 crocodile warriors and 1 crocodile behemoth. They were there to stop the barbarian lady from desecrating their ancestors' graves.
We've ruled that I'd begin the game with 5 mummies on the barrow hill, then roll 1D6 every turn thereafter. If I score 4+, I'd place another 5 until I've extracted all 15 from the ground.
As it happened, I placed the other 10 over two consecutive turns.
The warbands were:
Myran's Men
Figures: 8
Cost: 4111 x Myran, the Catfolk Captain (Q2+; C3; Long Move; Shooter: Medium)
4 x Catfolk Archer (Q3+; C3; Shooter: Medium)
2 x Crocodile Hammerer (Q3+; C3; Big; Long Move; Savage)
1 x Crocodile Behemoth (Q3+; C4; Big; Heavy Armor; Savage)
Ursula's Deadites
Figures: 17
Cost: 388
1 x Ursula, the Barbarian (Q3+; C3; Leader)
2 x Ander, the Slinger (Q3+; C2; Long Move; Shooter: Medium)
10 x Mummy Warrior (Q4+; C3; Mindless; Short Move)
5 x Mummy (Q4+; C2; Mindless; Short Move)
I'll try to include only the minimum of photos to keep the post length down. You can see the full set here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/18562240@N07/sets/72157622733809433/Here's the setup we settled on:
The river was impassable (pretend water). The dungeon connected to the sides of the board was meant to lie underneath the river, with an entrance on either side.
My goal was to bring the barbarian lady to the altar room you can see in the dungeon.
My opponent's goal was to kill her. Here's her setup:
I won the initiative and began by moving Ander to the side of the bridge, where he could shoot at enemies who'd stand on it.
Ursula issued a group move order to the mummies and had them shambling towards the bridge.
My opponent sent both crocodile warriors to the bridge to check my advance. The bridge would only allow up to three mummies to stand side by side, so she banked on the superior combat score of the crocodiles to hold my troops in the bottleneck.
Second turn saw another 5 mummies rise from the mass grave to swell my ranks. The crocodile warriors now occupied the bridge. Ander's sling could do little to pierce their tough leather hides.
The mummies clashed with the enemy at the foot of the bridge.
The next pic is pretty indicative of my luck throughout the game. ):
While the deadites were tied up with the crocs, Ursula legged it towards the dungeon, hoping to sneak into the altar room.
My opponent placed two archers across from the path Ursula would need to take to enter the dungeon--
--but Ander showed his loyalty by diverting their attention. Ursula successfully reached the ill-lit opening.
Ander evaded the arrows to follow Ursula into the dungeon, but Myran shot him dead as he rounded a corner.
Ursula fled from the dungeon. In the absence of her leadership, the mummies suffered casualties on the bridge. Her renewed presence reinvigorated their fighting spirit. The first crocodile warrior was brought down.
Outnumbered 3 to 1, the other followed shortly.
A lonely catfolk archer abandoned aim and let arrows loose over the sprawling horde.
His comrade in arms rushed to his side.
Together they formed a makeshift line of defense while another archer was closing in to assist them. A fourth archer took up position on top of the hill, hoping to spot the barbarian defiler and end the invasion with a single arrow.
The catfolk brought down another mummy before the undead horde washed over them.
One of the archers fell down, but recovered quickly.
Another mummy was laid to its final rest.
The remainder of my warband pulled up to the battle line.
The undead finally managed to break the line of defenders by killing one of the archers.
It was only a matter of time until the others followed suit.
The last archer was torn apart by the throng of walking dead.
My troops slowly approached the dungeon entrance.
Measuring sticks.
The archer stood fast in the face of certain death. This is the point where we've realized that neither of us have taken the morale tests once our warbands hit half their original number of models. So we decided to take it there. Nothing overly dramatic happened. The archer on the hill retreated into the forest, Ursula ran back over the bridge, and that was it. Everyone was back in business the following turn.
The archer had two opportunities to kill Ursula during the advance on the dungeon, but they were pretty remote and, chance had it, I made it to the entrance unscathed.
A couple of mummies fell down into the snow only to get back up the following turn.
The archer was doomed. He suffered a death so gruesome I could not bear to show a picture of it. p:
So my undead spilled into the dungeon.
Myran destroyed one of the mummies that assailed him, but, ultimately, his fate was sealed.
The behemoth did not care to stay in the doorway any longer and charged the mummies outside. He was so badly outnumbered that even his great strength failed to hurt my ranks.
He too suffered a gruesome death at the hands of mindless butchers.
Victory was mine! The way to the altar was clear. Ursula approached it and held out the amulet. The dead of the catacombs would serve her.
Final overview of the battlefield.
I can't recommend SoBaH enough. It's a great system - best skirmish rule set that I've come across so far. My partner enjoyed the game enough to vow vengeance once I get some appropriate minis painted up for a rematch.
Hope you've enjoyed the report.
-Michael