Warmaster Fantasy

 Back in the year 2000 Warmaster became popular at the club but interest died away when Games Workshop stopped supporting it and members moved on to other things. Warmaster Ancient Battles which came out later is still played fairly often by club members.

Alex and I decided to have a game using some of the amendments from the fan made Warmaster Revolution rules which are available here:https://www.wm-revolution.com/

I used my old Chaos army and Alex used Norse,mainly using his existing Anglo-Saxon figures fromWarmaster Ancients, adding giants and sylph archers. This is a 2,000 point game and the dice determined it would last 8 turns.

I concentrated my army on one side as I was outnumbered, hoping to overwhelm on one side before Alex's other side got involved. Sadly my right flank refused to move much. Alex's giant went wild and ran out on his own. I tried to get my cavalry over the hill to get him but they blundered and rushed towards the nearest visible enemy, breaking up their formation on the way.

I sent my left side group of infantry, along with the Chaos Hounds in reserve, off on the attack, they found themselves being charged by the enemy cavalry. The chaos hounds were lost but I won the other fight. The giant and my chaos spawn went back and forward with each other for a long time, I was happy to keep the giant occupied. After killing the spawn it went on to do an enormous amount of damage.

Making the best of the situation I moved my cavalry from the right, which were now in the centre racing out the left and charging the lines of infantry there.

 

They did well until the Norse Hearthguard charged the chaos hounds in the flank, went through them and started doing damage to he Chaos Knights.

After initial success my infantry had advanced towards the archers but now had cavalry in their flank and the Giant in their rear, a magic spell was frequently making Norse units cause terror, reducing my attack dice. This went on for a while, up the hill and down the side. At the end the Giant and one stand of archers were all that remained.

My big group in the centre refused to move until turn five, despite having the general as their own commander. They finally moved and I sent them over the hill attack the Norse centre who were still waiting in the village. Considering my advantage in quality I charged despite them being in a defended position. After losing the Norse withdrew and it was clear I wouldn't be able to destroy them before the end of the game. Some Norse had come out of their wood to threaten my flank but I was able to charge them in the last round.

We were both one unit away from breaking. I aimed to get my knights up the hill and finish the archers and giant, but the first unit failed to move. I had another general but fighting uphill against the giant I thought it was as likely to lose unit first as destroy one (the archers were only worth half a break point at a single stand) so I decided not to risk it. 

 

My infantry did some damage but the combat was a draw with no units destroyed. This was an exiting game with plenty of twists, and many blunders rolled by commanders. I'll look forward to playing more Warhammer Fantasy in the future.