Denethor’s Last Stand
I’ve been distracted from Tolkien recently, so it was nice to get a Zoom game in this afternoon based on the Silmarillion. We played using my own Midgard rules on a 3x4’ table. Tom WD and I took the Orcs, with James D as the valiant elves of Ossiriand.
During the First Battle, Denethor of Ossiriand was cut off on the hill of Amon Ereb and slain by orcs before help could arrive. As the elves of Ossiriand are described as ‘light-armed and no match for the Orcs, who were shod with iron and iron-shielded’, I decided to field their entire force as bow- and spear-armed skirmishers. To make matters worse, I restricted their force to 2/3 the size of the attacking orcs.
However, they had the advantage of the hill of Amon Ereb, and the orcs had to completely destroy the Elven force within five turns to win the game (after which Thingol would turn up with the relief force and win the battle - but that game is for another day).
The game played out very much as per Tolkien’s brief description of the encounter; the light-armed elves made good use of evasion to delay battle, although their bow fire was well below par (possibly James’s dice were to blame). However, the game went down to the wire as Denethor and his final unit survived until the last turn - but were then swallowed up by a tide of Orcs.
Good fun and a welcome return to Middle-earth!