My friend and I wanted to play this past weekend so we put some models on the table. I of course my Lizards and my friend his (darn) chaos dwarves! The Armies (via gentlemen agreement): Dwarves 1 x Drazhoath the Ashen 1 x Infernal Guard Castellan (General) 1 x Daemonsmith 20 x Infernal Guard Ironsworn 10 x Infernal Guard Fireglaives 20 x Hobgoblins 10 x Hobgoblin Wolf Riders 1 x Iron Daemon War Engine 2 x Deathshrieker Rocket Launchers 1 x Chaos Siege Giant Lizardmen Lord Kroak Chakax Gor-Rok (General) 20 x Saurus Warriors 20 x Temple Guard 10 x Saurus Cavalry 6 x Skink Handlers (3 with the salamander and 3 with the razordon) 1 x Salamander 1 x Razordons 1 x Stegadon 1 x Engine of the Gods 1 x Bastiladon We agreed to play a defensive scenario he put together (I’ll be sure to post it later, see how you all like it). We rolled to see what army defends and what army attacks. Lizards attack! (Much excitement from my part at this moment.) The scenario is played long ways on the table. My friend picked three pieces of terrain to hold and employed his entire army first. Once he set up, I employed my entire force. He gets to go first. Battle Round 1 Turn 1 – Hero phase, Castellan uses “inspiring presence” on the hobgoblins. No magic. Fireglaives, Hobgoblins, Wolf riders, Giant, Iron Daemon, Castellan, and Drazhoath move forward. Nothing in range of shooting. No close combat. Turn 2 – Hero phase, enemy units out of range for Gor-Rok command ability so I don’t use one (Dumb, I know now). Lord Kroak casts “comet’s call” 1 wound on the fireglaives, 3 wounds on the giant, 1-2 wounds on the hobgoblins. Failed to cast the other three spells. Everything moves forward. Salamander and razordon shoot, no wounds. Bastiladon shoots, 4 hobgoblins down. Stegadon shoots, 6 wounds on the iron daemon. No close combat. Battleshock – We forgot! Battle Round 2 Turn 1 – Hero phase, Castellan uses “inspiring presence” on the hobgoblins. No magic. Giant, Iron Daemon, and Drazhoath move forward. Dwarves open fire and all hell breaks loose! Salamander dies, cav loses 2, and the warriors lost 3 brave souls. Drazhoath charges the engine of the gods and proceeds to pound on the poor thing. 7 wounds. Engine of the gods attacks back 3. (not so good) Turn 2 – Hero phase, Lord Kroak fails to cast three spells and the one that actually goes through, Drazhoath dispels. (Darn you Dwarves!) Everything moves forward. Razordon shoots and puts 1 wound on the wolf riders. Stegadon shoots, 4 wounds on the iron daemon. Bastiladon shoots, 2 more hobgoblins die and then we charge. Stegadon and TG into the iron daemon. Cav into the giant. Warriors into the wolf riders. Chakax and Lord Kroak into Drazhoath. Bastiladon fails the charge. (3 inches and the heavy thing could not make it! Should have left some of that heavy armor at home.) Trying to protect my TG I start by attacking the iron daemon. The TG chopped “the little engine that though it could” to pieces. He picks the giant. Ouch! He took out 3 cav in one go. My turn, Engine of the gods into Drazhoath – 2 more wounds. (He has 11!) He attacks back with Drazhoath and kills the Engine of the gods. I move to the warriors and out of the 6 or so wounds that they deal he manages to save them all. He returns fire and kills 3 or so more warriors. Lord Kroak attacks and wounds twice and Chakax kills Drazhoath. Battleshock – I loose none (I love bravery 10!) He loses 2 hobgoblins and 1 wolf rider. Battle Round 3 (I should mention that the attacker rolls a dice for every unit that they lose. On a 3+ the unit comes back to the table.) Turn 1 – (Dwarves first again!)Hero phase, Castellan uses his command ability on my cav unit (now dwarves get to re-roll misses). No magic. Fireglaives move forward. Dwarves open fire again and manage to kill 8 warriors and 1 TG. Hobgoblins charge the skink handlers and the bastiladon killing 2 of the skinks and putting 1 wound on the bastiladon. The giant kills the rest of the cav unit, and the wolf riders kill another 4 warriors. The warriors manage to kill 2 wolf riders, the skink scores nothing, and the bastiladon kills 5 hobgoblins. Turn 2 – Hero phase, Gor-Rok uses his command ability on the ironsworn and Lord Kroak fails to cast three spells (again!) but manages to summon a unit of warriors. I manage to get back the engine of the gods, the cav unit, and the salamander. (Yay me!) The engine of the gods uses the cosmic engine and brings forward a seraphon unit. I decide to put Kroq-Gar on the table. (I know, I’m an “A-hole”!) TG move towards the ironsworn, warriors towards the giant, and the Stegadon moves towards his artillery. I shot with everything I had and managed to kill the rest of the hobgoblins, a few ironsworn, 2 fireglaives, and put 2 wounds on one of his deathshriekers. Cav charges the wolf riders, TG charge the ironsworn, Salamander and Engine of the gods into the fireglaives. Warriors into the giant. TG start attacking, 2-3 wounds. Giant took out 4 warriors. Engine of the gods erase the fireglaives. He attacks with the ironsworn, a few TG down. Cav attacks his wolf riders, 4 bite the dust. He returns fire and kills one of my cav. Battleshock – I lose nothing. He loses 2-3 more ironsworns and his last wolf rider. Battle Round 4 Turn 1 – (Of course he goes first yet again!) Hero phase, nothing significant. (can’t remember why.) Not much on the way of movement since he was trying to protect the two pieces of terrain he had control of. He shoots with his artillery and takes out one cav. Ironsworn attack the TG and kill one. TG return the favor and kill two or three more (five left ironsworn left and the hill is mine!) and the giant kill the remaining warriors. Turn 2 – Hero phase, Lord Kroak casts “comet’s call” and “arcane bolt”. 3 wound to the general, 2 wounds to the Daemonsmith, and 3 wounds to a deathshrieker. Engine of the gods calls down a bolt of azure energy and puts 2 more wounds on the giant. Cav moves about 3 inches from the ironsworn, Kroq-Gar, engine of the gods, and the bastiladon move towards the giant. The Stegadon moves towards the daemonsmith. The Stegadon shoots and misses. Kroq-Gar shoots and kills the enemy general. Everybody who is not in close combat is about to charge and my friends wife comes in with a “honey-do-list” for my friend. My friend decides to concede defeat and the lizards emerge victorious! At the end of the battle chaos dwarves had 1 half dead daemon smith, 1 almost dead deathshrieker, 1 unharmed deathshrieker, one half dead siege giant, and 4-5 ironsworn. Lizards had Lord Kroak, Kroq-Gar, Chakax, Gor-Rok, 12 TG, 2 warriors, 9 Saurus cavalry, 1 skink handler, 1 salamander, 1 razordon, 1 engine of the gods, 1 stegadon, and 1 bastiladon.
The wife, Greatest threat to all armies. How did you structure your gentleman's agreement for balance, and after playing do you think the lists were balanced (enough). I take it you perhaps both knew each other's armies well enough to know you were reasonably matched?
We decided to start with a model count. In this case 60 to 70 models. From there we agreed 2-3 heroes sounded about right. 4-5 monsters or artillery pieces and the rest make it whatever you felt you wanted to try out. Once we created a list, we showed each other what we were bringing to the table and since we were both ok with each other’s list, we played them. I do think the lists were balanced. He made some tactical errors and some judgment errors, and of course there is always “the dice” to take into account. But all in all, I believe he had a chance. He might not agree with me on this!
He's the only one person I know that has them. He has two other armies, but he favors the little Dwarves!
I'm... actually very jealous. My heart will always belong to the Lizards, of course, but I'd snap up a Chaos Dwarf army in a heartbeat if I could afford Forgeworld products. Good for him.