Warhammer Underworlds Battlereport: the first night of neck-romancing

 So, time to start playing a completely fresh warband and learn the ropes with them!

And for this week's casual gaming night, I opted for the Crimson Court, the awesome looking warband containing 4 vampires!

Now, in the future, I will often be switching between warbands as I want to try and taste them all (no pun intended), and I have some plans build up for both Nemesis and Rivals formats with different bands, but now it's time for the call of the night, as I will be fielding these guys in Ekeren as well should I get to play there as TO.

I expect the warband to play a rather "tanky-spanky" style, compared to my usual all-out aggro manner of playing, so I will have to restrain myself a bit from the all out rushing.

 

 

Facing me in the first game of the Crimson Court is Peter and the ill-fated lovers of Zondara's Gravebreakers, a warband I became very wary about after my previous encounter.   

The boards where laid down, and off we went with this duel amongst the dead!

I needed to learn to restrict myself, and I slowly let the Hunger take hold of my fighters as Cracktomb entered my territory to do some digging.

The zombie was quickly taken down by Gorath the Ennias for some early glory and upgrading purposes, only to be raised near Zondara immediatly after.  

The Vampires took a rather wait and see stance in the first turn, resulting in a 3-2 lead for Zondara on the board.

At the beginning of the second turn, Vellas von Faine rushed in, guided by Bloodthirst, and scythed away at Cracktomb and Zondara, but not causing any wounds, only managing to push the zombie away a bit.  But Ennias, also Bloodthirsted and with Vampiric Might, rushed in and with a critical hit resulting in him wounding for 4 damage, he eliminated Zondara from the game.

Allas, in retaliation Vellas was felled by the maddened Ferlain, heartstruck by the loss of his lover.

The result was a 7-4 lead for Zondara after this round, even though it might look okay for the Vampires with one of the two lovers taken out and Ennias now a threat to the werewolf as well to one-shot it if needed.

Peter realizes this, and Ennias is quickly surrounded by his force, but manages to survive as Prince Duvall enters the fray and engages Ferlain... managing to wound him.

Using a power card, Peter withdraws the werewolf to safer areas and upgrade him to 5 wounds, meaning he would be out of my reach to finish off.  If he had remained at 4 wounds, I could gamble on the Inspired Gorath's Vile Transference to get the kill.

 

 

But as it stood, it was time to cycle cards while Ennias weathered the storm, Peter forgetting to give an upgrade to do 2 damage as the Armour of Marusi would negate the single wound his zombie would do on the bestial vampire.  I offered afterwards to let it count and give him the win, but he politely declined the offer.  Must be the first time there was negotiating to be allowed to loose I guess.

 

 

But as such, the game ended at a 12-11 victory for the Crimson Court in their first outing.

 

 

For the second game, Wouter sat down across me, and fielded the Gnarlspirit Pack.  A potent warband that I never faced before, I would be at the receiving end of some brutal aggro, talk about a world upside down.

 

 

 The boards where set and I took on the rather far away deployment like in the first game to see what these mystics would bring. 

That predator sure looks scary...

Lupan Longcut made the first charge, wounding Gorath with his spear before Ennias countercharged.  But Crimson Kheira rushed in, finishing my von Carstein spellcaster, definitly a set back.

Prince Duvalle charges her in return, wounding her, before Vellas joined the fray but she misses in this battle of the red-headed ladies.

As a result, a measly 1-2 score is on the board after round 1.

Beginning the second round, Vellas now does take Kheira down, mumbling something about how that savage can even think of looking as good as herself.

Led by Sarrakar Blackwing himself, the Pack starts closing in on the vampires, and as he is now a level 3 wizard his Raptor Bolt starts damaging my neck-romancers.

Prince Duvalle, weakened by such a bolt, falls after a failed attempt to wound the mystic leader, and Gorl Spinehammer is just to much for him to handle.  This leaves only the inspired Vellas and bloodthirsted Ennias to handle the pack.

The round ended with the Court and the Pack both having obtained 5 glory points.

Ennias, again empowered with Vampiric Might, charges Sarrakar, hoping for the crits against all the defence boosts the wizard has to hopefully one shot him, but misses fragrantly, but saves himself against the odds on the return attack.

 

 

Vellas in the meantime flees to the other side of the board, boosted to move 6 by an upgrade, as Ennias falls in the end against the savage might, a loss that would cost me dearly, even though it allowed me to score the surge of having all my surviving models in enemy territory.  I cycled through some cards to hopefully score, but fell short barely in the end.

The Gnarlspirit Pack took home a 10-9 victory against the Crimson Court.

Surely, this second game had some what if moments, like Ennias twice failing a chance to one-shot his leader, but it will take some time to get used to their playing style and objectives, as it is a whole lot different from my usual rush-in warbands.

Never the less, one up one down on a new warband first outing is not to bad, now to finetune them a bit in the future and figure out how to Hunger them out faster before taking them to the Into the Under-Ekeren event in all probability.